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CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION 


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Barrows'  Xectures,  1896*07 


CHRISTIANITY 
THE  WORLD-RELIGION 


LECTURES  DELIVERED  IN  INDIA 
AND  JAPAN 


JOHN  HENRY  T^ARROWS,  D.D. 

PRESIDENT  OF   THE   WORI.d's    FIRST   PARLIAMENT  OF    RELIGIONS,    AND 

HASKELL   LECTURER    ON    COMPARATIVE    RELIGION    IN 

THE   UNIVERSITY   OF   CHICAGO 


CHICAGO 

A.  C.  McCLURG   AND  COMPANY 

1897 


Copyright 

By  a.  C.  McClurg  &  Co. 

A.  D.  1897 


TO 

MRS.   CAROLINE   E.   HASKELL 

THE  ELECT  LADY,   BELOVED    AND    HONORED   IN  THE   EAST  AND  IN  THE 
WEST,    WHOSE  LIBERALITY  FOUNDED 
THE   INDIAN   LECTURESHIP,    THIS  VOLUME,    THE  FIRST- 
FRUITS   OF   HER   ENDOWMENT, 
IS  GRATEFULLY   DEDICATED,    WITH  ADMIRATION 
FOR  HER  WORLD-EMBRACING 
PHILANTHROPY   AND  HER  BRAVE  AND   FAR-SEEING  FAITH, 
AND  ALSO  IN 
RECOGNITION  OF  HER  SPLENDID  SERVICES 
TO  THE  CAUSE  OF 
ORIENTAL   LEARNING  IN  AMERICA 
AND  OF  THE   EXPANDING  KINGDOM  OF  GOD  IN  THE 
CONTINENT  OF  ASIA. 


TABLE    OF   CONTENTS 


EXTRACT   FROM    MRS.    HASKELL  S    LETTER    FOUNDING 

THE    BARROWS    LECTURESHIP,  .  •  Q 

PREFACE,  ......  13 

LECTURE  I. 

THE   WORLD-WIDE    ASPECTS   OF    CHRISTIANITY,  23 

LECTURE    IL 

THE   WORLD-WIDE    EFFECTS   OF    CHRISTIANITY,  69 

LECTURE  in. 

CHRISTIAN   THEISM,   AS   THE    BASIS    OF   A   UNIVERSAL 

RELIGION,        ......  Ill 

LECTURE  IV. 

THE  UNIVERSAL   BOOK,  ....  157 

LECTURE  V. 

THE   UNIVERSAL    MAN   AND   SAVIOUR,  .  .  201 

LECTURE  VI. 

THE   HISTORIC   CHARACTER  OF  CHRISTIANITY  AS  CON- 
FIRMING ITS  CLAIMS  TO  WORLD-WIDE  AUTHORITY,      243 

LECTURE  VII. 

THE   world's   PARLIAMENT   OF   RELIGIONS,  .  293 

APPENDIX— DR.   BARROWS   IN   INDIA    AND   JAPAN.     BY 

REV.   ROBERT   A.   HUME,   D.  D.,  .  .  .  33I 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    AND   NOTES,  ...  351 

INDEX  .......  407 


EXTRACT  FROM  MRS.  HASKELL'S  LET- 
TER FOUNDING  THE  BARROWS 
LECTURESHIP. 

"Chicago,  Oct.  12,  1894. 
"To  President  William  R.  Harper,  Ph.D.,  D.D. 

"My  dear  Sir: — I  take  pleasure  in  offering  to 
the  University  of  Chicago  the  sum  of  twenty  thou- 
sand dollars  for  the  founding  of  a  second  Lecture- 
ship on  the  Relations  of  Christianity  and  the  other 
Religions.  These  lectures,  six  or  more  in  number, 
are  to  be  given  in  Calcutta  (India),  and,  if  deemed 
best,  in  Bombay,  Madras,  or  some  other  of  the 
chief  cities  of  Hindustan,  where  large  numbers  of 
educated  Hindus  are  familiar  with  the  English  lan- 
guage. The  wish,  so  earnestly  expressed  by  Mr. 
P.  C.  Mozoomdar,  that  a  Lectureship  like  that 
which  I  had  the  privilege  of  founding  last  summer 
might  be  provided  for  India,  has  led  me  to  consider 
the  desirability  of  establishing  in  some  great  col- 
legiate center  like  Calcutta  a  course  of  lectures  to 
be  given,  either  annually,  or  as  may  seem  better, 
biennially,  by  leading  Christian  scholars  of  Eu- 
rope, Asia  and  America,  in  which,  in  a  friendly, 
temperate,  conciliatory  way,  and  in  the  fraternal 
spirit  which  pervaded  the  Parliament  of  Religions, 
the  great  questions  of  the  truths  of  Christianity, 
its  harmonies  with  the  truths  of  other  religions,  its 
rightful    claims,  and    the    best    method    of    setting 

9 


lO  EXTRACT  FROM  LETTER. 

them  forth,  should  be  presented  to  the  scholarly 
and  thoughtful  people  of  India. 

"It  is  my  purpose  to  identify  this  work,  which 
I  believe  will  be  a  work  of  enlightenment  and  fra- 
ternity, with  the  University  Extension  Department 
of  the  University  of  Chicago,  and  it  is  my  desire 
that  the  management  of  this  Lectureship  should  lie 
with  yourself,  as  President  of  all  the  departments 
of  the  University,  with  Rev.  John  Henry  Barrows, 
D.D.,  the  Professorial  Lecturer  on  Comparative 
Religion,  with  Professor  George  S.  Goodspeed,  the 
Associate  Professor  of  Comparative  Religion,  and 
with  those  who  shall  be  your  and  their  successors 
in  these  positions.  It  is  my  request  that  this  Lec- 
tureship shall  bear  the  name  of  John  Henry  Bar- 
rows, who  has  identified  himself  with  the  work  of 
promoting  friendly  relations  between  Christian 
America  and  the  people  of  India.  I  hope  also  that 
he  may  be  the  first  lecturer.  The  committee  hav- 
ing the  management  of  these  lectures  shall  also 
have  the  authority  to  determine  whether  any  of  the 
courses  shall  be  given  in  Asiatic  or  other  cities 
outside  of  India. 

"In  reading  the  proceedings  of  the  Parliament 
of  Religions,  I  have  been  struck  with  the  many 
points  of  harmony  between  the  different  faiths, 
and  the  possibility  of  so  presenting  Christianity  to 
others  as  to  win  their  favorable  interest  in  its 
truths.  If  the  committee  shall  decide  to  utilize 
this  Lectureship  still  further  in  calling  forth  the 
views  of  scholarly  representatives  of  the  non-Chris- 
tian faiths,  I  authorize  and  shall  approve  such  a  de- 
cision.     Only  good  will   grow  out   of  such   a   com- 


EXTRACT  FROM  LETTER.  II 

parison  of  views.  It  is  my  wish  that,  accepting  the 
offer  which  I  now  make,  the  committee  of  the  Uni- 
versity will  correspond  with  the  leaders  of  religious 
thought  in  India,  and  secure  from  them  such  help- 
ful suggestions  as  they  may  be  ready  to  give.  I 
cherish  the  expectation  that  the  Barrows  Lectures 
will  prove,  in  years  that  shall  come,  a  new  golden 
bond  between  the  East  and  West.  In  the  belief 
that  this  foundation  will  be  blessed  by  our  Heav- 
enly Father,  to  the  extension  of  the  benign  influ- 
ence of  our  great  University,  to  the  promotion  of 
the  highest  interests  of  humanity,  and  to  the 
enlargement  of  the  kingdom  of  Truth  and  Love  on 
earth,  I  remain,  with  much  regard, 

"Yours  sincerely, 

"CAROLINE  E.  HASKELL." 


PREFACE. 

The  Lectures  contained  in  this  book  have 
received  no  additions  and  only  a  few  sHght 
changes.  They  are  pubHshed  as  they  were  given 
in  India.  As  delivered  in  Japan,  some  slight 
alterations  in  them  were,  of  course,  indispens- 
able. I  have  not  thought  it  wise  to  depart  from 
the  popular  style  and  character  of  address  which 
seemed  best  fitted  to  the  original  purpose  of  my 
spoken  message. 

The  Indian  Lectureship  was  fortunate  in  its 
connection  with  a  movement  of  fraternity  and 
conciliation  which  deeply  touched  the  heart  of 
India.  After  the  work  which  I  was  permitted 
to  inaugurate  after  six  thousand  miles  of  travel, 
in  which  I  crossed  the  Indian  peninsula  five 
times,  delivering  more  than  one  hundred  and 
ten  lectures  and  addresses,  meeting  hundreds  of 
missionaries  and  Christian  teachers,  and  also 
many  hundreds  of  non-Christian  friends,  and 
speaking  to  thousands  of  restless  and  inquisitive 
youths,  my  estimate  of  the  possible  usefulness 
of  the  Lectureship,  especially  when  it  is  held  in 
abler  hands  than  mine,  has  been  augmented.  If 
Christian  lectureships  are  useful  in  Oxford, 
Edinburgh   and    New  York,    they   may  become 

13 


14  PREFACE. 

much  more  useful  in  a  country  like  India,  where 
the  foundations  of  rational  Christian  faith  must 
be  laid.  I  have  long  believed  in  Christian  edu- 
cation as  a  main  factor  in  India's  evangelization. 
The  Lectureship  comes  in  as  a  supplement  to 
this  force.  It  brings  a  fresh  speaker  to  the 
inquiring  and  changing  Indian  life,  and  it  secures 
for  him  a  sympathetic  hearing.  Furthermore, 
well-known  and  scholarly  men  going  to  India 
from  Europe  or  America  are  sure  to  gain  larger 
audience  than  those  already  resident  in  India, 
and  returning  to  their  own  lands  after  a  few 
months  of  contact  with  the  wondrous  life  of  the 
East,  they  will  be  able  to  speak  with  more  in- 
terest and  personal  knowledge  in  regard  to  the 
progress  and  the  needs  of  Christ's  Kingdom. 

The  subject  which  I  selected  for  this  inaugu- 
rating series  of  lectures  was  chosen  with  several 
objects  in  view.  I  desired  to  fasten  attention  on 
the  supreme  and  distinctive  truths  which  center 
in  Christ.  It  is  certain  that  many  educated 
Hindus  who  know  something  of  Christianity 
misconceive  it.  They  regard  as  supreme  and 
vital  what  is  only  secondary  and  non-essential. 
Believing  that  the  spirit  and  substance  of  the 
Christian  religion  are  found  in  the  Christ  of  the 
Gospels,  I  made  my  most  earnest  effort  to  con- 
centrate upon  Him  the  constant  attention  of  my 
hearers,  whether  I  met  them  in  the  college 
halls  of  Calcutta  or  in  the  Town  Hall  of 
Lahore,  whether  on  the  Malabar  coast  or  where 


PREFACE.  15 

the   long  waves   dash   on   the   stormy  shores  of 
Coromandel. 

My  second  purpose  was  to  lodge  in  the  Hindu 
mind  our  conviction  that  Christianity  is  essen- 
tially a  universal  religion,  divinely  adapted  to  the 
spiritual  needs  of  each  man,  whatever  his  race, 
rank  or  nation.  The  sensitive  Hindu,  who  for 
long  ages  has  scarcely  looked  beyond  his  own 
beloved  Aryavarta,  is  not  easily  disposed  to  favor 
the  claim  that  anything  outside  of  India  is 
mighty  enough  to  take  up  and  include  his  own 
land,  with  its  great  religious  philosophies  and  its 
three  thousand  years  of  intellectual  history. 
Christianity,  although  it  had  lingered  since  the 
fourth  century  on  the  West  Coast  in  the  Syrian 
Church,  and  although  it  had  touched  Southern 
India  in  the  apostolic  labors  of  Xavier,  appeared 
to  the  Hindu  mind  chiefly  as  the  religion  of  his 
English  conquerors.  Then  he  came  to  regard  it 
as  the  faith  belonging  in  various  forms  to  the 
Western  world  of  railroads  and  iron  steamers, 
the  world  of  fire-arms  and  materialistic  science. 
He  saw  clearly  some  of  the  unlovely  aspects  of 
Christendom,  and  the  name  Christian  had  none 
of  the  attractiveness  for  him  which  it  possesses 
for  Europeans  and  Americans.  Flattered  by  the 
praises,  sometimes  indiscriminate,  of  Western 
scholars,  who  unearthed  for  him  his  own  sacred 
literature,  he  began  to  think  that  he  possessed 
something  already  which  rendered  Christianity, 
at   least   for  him,   unnecessary.      Of   late   years, 


1 6  PREFACE. 

during  the  so-called  Hindu  revival,  he  has  been 
strengthened  in  his  feeling  that  Hinduism,  re- 
formed and  purified,  is  good  enough  for  his  peo- 
ple, and  indeed  possesses  a  glory  which  does 
not  belong  to  the  Christian  Gospel.  It  was, 
therefore,  my  effort  to  show  that  Christianity, 
judged  by  any  tests  which  bring  out  its  true 
nature,  is  the  universal  religion.  The  earnest 
proclamation  of  the  essential  universality  of  the 
Christian  faith  was,  of  course,  not  altogether 
acceptable  to  the  proud  and  isolated  Hindu 
spirit.  It  has  been  the  habit  of  that  spirit  in 
recent  years  to  claim  for  Hinduism  every  ex- 
cellence claimed  by  other  religions.  My  persist- 
ent advocacy  of  Christ's  universal  claims,  and 
my  insistence  that  Christianity  is  a  missionary 
religion,  seeking  after  the  whole  world  with  its 
message  of  life  and  salvation,  stirred  up  not  a 
little  antagonism.  But  I  was  not  so  much  sur- 
prised at  this  as  at  the  general  kindness,  court- 
esy, patience  and  attention  with  which  my  mes- 
sage was  received. 

The  subject  and  treatment  of  my  lectures 
were  determined  by  another  consideration  and 
purpose,  the  desire  to  furnish  a  convenient, 
comprehensive  and  readable  summary  of  Chris- 
tian Evidences  in  the  light  of  comparative  study. 
The  Indians  are  a  reading  people,  and  India  is 
the  country  of  cheap  printing.  And  while  there 
are  many  books  of  Christian  Evidences,  and 
valuable  works   in   which   Christianity  and    Hin- 


PREFACE.  17 

duism  are  compared,  I  do  not  know  that  India 
is  familiar  with  any  vokime  wherein  the  su- 
premacy of  Christianity  is  continuously  set  forth, 
as  compared  not  only  with  Hinduism,  but  with 
the  other  competing  religions. 

It  does  not  seem  appropriate  that  I  should  fill 
this  preface  with  the  names  of  the  multitude  of 
friends,  who,  in  America,  Great  Britain,  France, 
Germany,  Egypt,  India,  Japan  and  the  Hawaiian 
Islands,  contributed,  in  one  way  or  another,  to 
the  pleasure  and  interest  of  my  world-pilgrim- 
age and  to  whatever  success  may  have  belonged 
to  my  undertaking.  I  have  come  to  feel  that 
the  empire  of  good  will  is  the  most  comprehen- 
sive now  existing  on  the  earth.  The  domain  of 
fraternity  is  practically  world-wide.  I  have 
heard  the  voice  of  kindness  within  the  cathe- 
drals of  Old  England,  and  the  bronzed  and 
lacquered  sanctuaries  of  Japan.  I  have  experi- 
enced the  warmth  of  brotherly  affection  from 
Roman  Catholic  Monsignors,  Syrian  Bishops, 
and  Greek,  Coptic,  and  Armenian  Patriarchs. 
My  mission  to  India  was  blessed  by  the  prayers 
of  Christians  in  America,  and  welcomed  by  men 
of  all  faiths  in  the  Orient.  The  most  famous 
of  scholars,  Professor  Max  Muller,  of  Oxford, 
gave  it  his  kindest  interest  and  good  wishes.  It 
received  the  benediction  of  the  venerable  states- 
man of  France,  the  late  Jules  Simon,  and  the 
more  venerable  Patriarch  of  Alexandria,  the  suc- 
cessor of  Athanasius.     I  have  clasped  the  friendly 


l8  PREFACE. 

hands  of  Jain,  Moslem  and  Parsee  scholars,  and 
of  the  sages  of  the  Buddhist  and  Confucianist 
faiths.  The  garlands  which  the  dark  hands  of 
kindly  Hindus,  in  accordance  with  the  beautiful 
Eastern  custom,  placed  around  our  necks,  have 
bound  our  affections  to  the  brilliant  and  suffer- 
ing East,  and  as  I  think  of  the  faces  which  have 
been  upturned  toward  ours,  faces  as  bright  with 
intelligence  and  good-will  as  they  were  em- 
browned by  tropic  suns,  I  realize  how  strong 
and  lasting  is  that  pathetic  appeal  which  Asia 
henceforth  makes  to  my  grateful  heart. 

The  welcome  and  hospitality  with  which  the 
Christian  missionaries  in  India  and  Japan  re- 
ceived us  into  their  homes  were  unspeakably 
kind,  and  one  of  my  deepest  joys  in  recalling 
my  busy  months  in  the  Orient  is  their  constant 
testimony  that  my  mission  was  in  some  measure 
a  help  and  encouragement  to  their  work.  It 
would  be  ungracious  and  ungrateful  in  me  not 
to  record  the  names  of  at  least  five  among  the 
many  friends  who  aided  in  successfully  inaugu- 
rating the  India  Lectureship:  Hon.  and  Rev. 
William  Miller,  D.D.,  CLE.,  President  of  the 
Christian  College,  Madras;  Rev.  K.  S.  Macdon- 
ald,  D.D.,  and  Principal  John  Morrison,  M.A., 
Calcutta;  Rev.  P.  C.  Mozoomdar,  of  the  Brahmo 
Soma],  and  the  Rev.  Robert  A.  Hume,  D.D., 
of  Ahmednagar. 

I  can  wish  for  my  successors  in  the  Indian 
Lectureship  no  more  interesting  experiences  than 


PREFACE.  19 

those  which  made  my  recent  visit  to  the  Land  of 
the  Vedas  a  chief  event  in  my  life.  However 
slight  a  contribution  to  the  religious  discussions 
of  our  times  this  book  may  be  deemed,  it  must 
be  evident  that  the  conception  of  Christianity 
herein  embodied  is  fast  coming  to  the  front,  and 
will  more  and  more  absorb  the  attention  of  the 
friends  and  foes  of  the  Christian  religion.  In 
this  conception  will  be  found  the  abiding  mo- 
tives of  Christian  missionary  effort.  I  saw  India 
in  a  year  of  plague  and  famine,  and  I  hope  that 
the  readers  of  this  volume,  both  in  the  East  and 
the  West,  may  be  helped  by  it  to  discover  anew 
or  for  the  first  time  that  a  Divine  Physician 
stands  ready  to  heal  the  dreadful  plague  of  sin, 
and  that  the  famine  of  the  soul  may  be  removed 
by  Him  who  still    says,    "I    am    the    Bread    of 

Life." 

JOHN  HENRY  BARROWS. 

The  Seven  Pines, 

Island  of  Mackinac,  Michigan. 
September  6th,  1897. 


THE  WORLD-WIDE  ASPECTS  OF 
CHRISTIANITY. 


And  nations  shall  come  to  thy  light,  and  kings  to  the 
brightness  of  thy  rising.     Isaiah,  Ix.  3. 

And  they  shall  come  from  the  east  and  west,  and  from 
the  north  and  south,  and  shall  sit  down  in  the  Kingdom  of 
God.     Luke,  xiii.  29. 

And  ye  shall  be  my  witnesses  both  in  Jerusalem,  and  in 
all  Judcea  and  Samaria,  and  unto  the  uttermost  part  of  the 
earth.     Acts,  i.  8. 

Jesus  ist  der  Christus  Israels  gewesen  und  das  Christen- 
thum  ist  aus  der  Offenbarungsreligion  der  Semiten  geboren. 
Aber  die  edelsten  Krafte  Jafets  haben  dabei  mitwirker 
miissen.  Jesus  ist  mehr  als  ein  Prophet  Israels  gewesen, 
und  mehr,  als  Israels  hochste  Hoffnung  von  seinem  Konige 
erwartete.  Er  ist  die  Offenbarung  Gottes  fiir  die  Menschen- 
kinder.  Und  das  Christenthum  ist  die  Welt-religion,  in  der 
der  religios-prophetische  Geist  Sems  sich  mit  dem  philoso- 
phischen  und  civilisatorischen  Geiste  Jafets  vermahlt. — 
Grundriss  der  Christlichen  Apologetik  von  Dr.  Herm. 
Schultz,  p.  84. 

"  A  national  religion,"  Mozoomdar  said,  "may  be  a  very 
fine  thing;  but  a  rational  religion  is  grander."  To  which 
noble  words  I  would  add:  Any  religion  which  boasts  of 
being  national  proclaims  to  the  world  the  fact  that  it  is  not 
the  Universal  Religion.  As  well  may  men  ask  for  a  national 
geography  or  a  national  astronomy  as  for  a  national  re- 
ligion.—Universal  Religion,  a  lecture  delivered  at  Banga- 
lore in  Nov.,  1896,  by  Edward  P.  Rice,  B.  A.,  p.  4- 


FIRST  LECTURE. 

THE    WORLD-WIDE    ASPECTS    OF    CHRISTIANITY. 

I  deem  it  one  of  the  chief  privileges  of  my 
life  that  I  am  permitted  to  inaugurate  this  Lect- 
ureship, which  I  hope  may  prove  a  bond  of 
brotherhood  between  the  East  and  the  West. 
My  interest  in  this  land  of  India,  which  cradled 
the  old  religions,  and  has  been  a  theater  for  the 
activity  of  the  newer  faiths,  has  continued 
through  years.  Before  the  Parliament  of  Re- 
ligions was  held  I  entered  into  correspondence 
with  many  of  those  who  lead  in  the  religious 
activities  and  developments  of  this  people. 

Some  of  them  made  the  long  journey  to 
America,  and  gave  us  their  views  of  the  prob- 
lems of  human  life  and  destiny.  Before  return- 
ing, these  speakers  at  that  Congress  expressed 
the  hope  that  I  might  be  able  to  visit  India,  a 
hope  which  I  fully  shared,  although  at  that  time 
such  a  visit  as  this  seemed  a  remote  possibility. 
A  year  after  the  Parliament  closed,  however,  a 
Christian  lady  who  had  been  deeply  interested 
in  that  meeting  founded  this  Lectureship,  en- 
trusting its  conduct  to  the  University  of  Chi- 
cago.    And   she  accompanied   her  gift  with  the 

23 


24    CIIRISTIANITT,  THE    WORLD-RELIGION. 

request  that  I  should  be  the  first  speaker  on  this 
foundation,  and  also  with  a  statement  of  her 
thoughts  and  wishes.  Her  purpose  was  to 
establish  courses  of  scholarly  lectures  in  the  col- 
legiate centers  of  India,  in  which,  "in  a  friendly, 
temperate,  conciliatory  way,  and  in  the  fraternal 
spirit  which  pervaded  the  Parliament  of  Re- 
ligions, the  great  questions  of  the  truths  of  Chris- 
tianity, its  harmonies  with  the  truths  of  other 
religions,  its  rightful  claims  and  the  best  method 
of  setting  them  forth,  should  be  presented  to  the 
scholarly  and  thoughtful  people  of  India." 

Mrs.  Haskell,  both  in  her  gift  and  in  her  let- 
ter, has  shown  how  broad  and  charitable  is  her 
mind  and  how  generous  and  loving  is  her  heart. 
Possessed  of  an  ample  fortune,  she  has  made 
large  gifts  to  hospitals,  institutions  for  the  care 
of  orphan  children,  and  for  aged  people,  churches 
of  different  denominations,  and  societies  for  the 
prevention  of  cruelty  to  animals.  Tender- 
hearted toward  all  suffering,  she  has  been  broad- 
minded  and  wise  in  promoting  the  higher  educa- 
tion. She  has  founded  in  the  University  of 
Chicago  a  Lectureship  which  bears  her  name,  on 
the  relations  of  Christianity  and  the  other  faiths, 
and  by  the  gift  of  more  than  iJ^20,ooo  has  built 
the  Haskell  Oriental  Museum,  the  first  great 
building  in  America  dedicated  entirely  to  Ori- 
ental studies.  Her  mind  has  taken  in  the  whole 
world,  and  in  founding  this  Lectureship  as  a 
permanent    institution    she    has    manifested    her 


ASPECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  25 

love  to  a  people  and  a  country  that  she  has 
never  seen.  She  has  desired  to  increase  their 
opportunities  of  becoming  acquainted  with  that 
Christian  faith  whose  compassionate  spirit  she 
nobly  illustrates.  Now  in  her  seventy-sixth 
year,  she  sends  her  blessings,  through  the  voice 
of  another,  to  the  people  of  India,  and  is  calmly 
confident  that  good  results  will  follow  this  effort 
to  advance  the  kingdom  of  righteousness  and 
love  by  casting  seeds  of  celestial  truth  on  the 
ancient  streams  of  the  mystic  and  memory- 
haunted  Asiatic  world.  She  believes  that  you 
will  give  a  welcome  and  a  sympathetic  hearing 
to  generous-minded  scholars,  who  come  in  the 
spirit  of  love,  and  whose  purpose  is  not  so  much 
to  pull  down  as  to  build  up,  and  who,  acknowl- 
edging that  the  SjDirit  of  God  has  been  working 
everywhere,  that  rays  of  heavenly  truth  have 
been  shining  everywhere,  that  voices  of  prophetic 
tone  have  been  sounding  everywhere,  are  eager  to 
communicate  such  messages  of  the  Spirit,  such 
gleams  of  heavenly  light,  such  utterances  of 
divine  consolation  as  have  come  to  them  in 
connection  with  the  ministration  of  Jesus  Christ. 
No  wise  Christian  believer,  it  seems  to  me,  would 
uproot  or  destroy  anything  in  Oriental  lands 
which  he  deems  true  and  useful.  I  am  sure  that 
the  scholarly  Hindus  who  have  accepted  Chris- 
tianity and  are  now  rejoicing  in  what  they  find 
in  Christ  still  maintain  their  faith  in  all  the 
ethical  and  spiritual  verities  of  Hinduism,  adding 


26     CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

thereto  a  supreme  and  satisfying  faith  in  the 
person  and  work  of  their  Lord  and  Saviour. 
They  are  not  less  devoted  to  India's  welfare  than 
their  non-Christian  brethren,  and  they  are  not 
less  proud  of  all  that  is  truly  great  in  India's 
past  history. 

Under  the  commission  which  I  bear  it  is  my 
privilege  and  duty  to  give  my  message  in  a  spirit 
of  friendliness  and  conciliation,  to  set  forth  the 
rightful  claims  of  Christianity,  without  forget- 
ting its  points  of  contact  with  other  faiths.  I 
have  not  come  to  India  for  controversy.  What 
I  seek,  and  what  I  believe  you  will  freely  grant, 
is  a  candid  hearing  to  these  lectures,  in  which  I 
shall  propose  the  inquiry — "Is  Christianity  fitted 
to  become  the  world-religion?"  This  is  a  vital 
question,  and  I  ask  you  to  give  it  your  careful 
consideration  to  the  close  of  these  six  addresses. 
While  each  lecture  will  treat  a  special  part  of  the 
theme,  it  will  be  necessary  for  the  candid  hearer, 
in  order  to  judge  of  the  argument  offered,  to 
take  under  his  survey  the  whole  field.  I  have 
not  come  to  India  to  discuss  those  great  systems 
of  philosophy,  which  are  the  astonishing  product 
of  the  subtle  Hindu  mind.^  Matters  of  chiefly 
intellectual  interest  are  not  grave  enough  to  jus- 
tify the  efforts,  or  to  fulfill  the  hopes  of  this 
Lectureship.  The  ethical  and  spiritual  problems 
are  the  deepest.  They  have  a  universal  inter- 
est.     God,  man,  duty,  worship,  escape  from  sin 

'  Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  I. 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  27 

and  evil,  triumph  over  the  world,  reconciliation, 
peace  through  fellowship  with  the  Heavenly 
Father,  and  hope  which  death  cannot  annihilate, 
— these  words  suggest  the  main  problems  of 
human  life. 

The  present  lectures  deal  with  religion,  or 
man's  devout  attitude  toward  the  universe,  a 
universe  glorified  by  the  presence  of  God.  Man's 
religion  concerns  the  being  of  the  Infinite  Spirit, 
and  his  personal  relations  to  that  Spirit.  It  is 
explained  by  such  words  as  reverence,  worship, 
duty,  repentance,  aspiration,  love. 

When  we  consider  man,  after  he  has  risen  to 
the  dignity  of  thought,  we  find  him  an  inquirer 
gazing  into  a  mysterious  world.  He  stands  on  an 
isthmus  between  the  oceans  of  two  eterni- 
ties. Out  of  mystery  he  came,  and  into  mystery 
he  goes.  He  recognizes  himself,  he  recognizes  the 
world  outside  of  himself,  he  recognizes  also  that 
there  is  a  connection  between  the  two — some- 
thing binding  them  together,  the  great  all-sur- 
rounding unity,  which  he  calls  the  universe.^  He 
cannot  rationally  divorce  this  creation  from  the 
thought  of  creative  powers,  and  though  he  has 
believed  in  the  presence  of  many  supernatural 
beings,  he  has  generally,  if  often  vaguely,  recog- 
nized a  Supreme  Divinity  behind  all  others,  and, 
with  the  disclosures  of  recent  science,  he  has 
reached  the  conclusion  that  there  can  be  but  one 
mind  back  of  phenomena. 

2  Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  2. 


28    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

It  has  been  truly  said  by  Professor  Drum- 
mond  that  "the  sun  and  stars  have  been  found 
out.  If  science  has  not,  by  searching,  found 
out  God,  it  has  not  found  any  other  God,  or 
anything  the  least  like  a  God,  that  might  con- 
tinue to  be  even  a  conceivable  object  of  worship 
in  a  scientific  age." 

As  we  study  man,  even  in  his  degradation,  we 
find  him  to  be  a  worshipful  being.  Pre-historic 
men  had  their  idols,  and  beliefs  in  the  life  be- 
yond were  indicated  by  their  burial  customs. 
Thus,  religion  is  not  something  imposed  upon 
man  but  something  that  springs  up  within  him. 
The  doctrine  of  a  God,  immanent  as  well  as 
transcendent,  simplifies  some  of  the  questions 
regarding  the  origin  of  religion.^  We  trace  its 
birth  not  to  the  call  of  Abraham  or  to  the  hymns 
sung  by  the  Vedic  man  "under  the  bright  sky 
and  beneath  the  burning  stars  of  India."  Its 
origin  is  not  with  the  priests  of  the  Nile  or  the 
miracles  of  the  New  Testament.  It  is  older  than 
history.  We  say  that  it  is  "instinctive  "  for 
men  to  recognize  the  supernatural  origin  and 
environment  of  life.  They  may  call  God  by  a 
hundred  names,  and  the  gods  of  the  Hindu  my- 
thology by  a  hundred  thousand,  but  they  cannot 
get  permanently  away  from  the  Infinite  Spirit. 
They  learn,  as  one  has  said,  that  "behind  all  the 
phenomena  of  nature  there  is  a  cause,  that  be- 
hind  the   apparent   is   the   real,  that  behind  the 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  3. 


ASPECTS   OF  CHRISTIANITT.  29 

shadow  there  is  the  substance,  that  behind  the 
transitory  there  is  the  eternal."  Man  discov- 
ers, but  does  not  make,  the  relations  and  laws  which 
enter  into  the  substance  of  religion;  and  hence 
it  is  true  that,  if  all  the  books  that  are  deemed 
sacred  were  burned,  if  the  historic  records  were 
all  obliterated,  if  the  temples  and  rituals  and 
elaborated  creeds  of  to-day  were  swept  out  of 
sight  and  out  of  mind,  and  if  only  the  infant 
children  now  living  in  the  world  were  to  con- 
tinue to  live  after  this  hour,  though  the  loss 
would  be  unspeakable — Sinai,  the  Mount  of 
Beatitudes,  Calvary,  all  gone — still  the  young, 
new  race  would  learn  to  recognize  the  divine, 
and  build  the  altars  of  faith ;  religion  would 
return  because  the  old  heart-hunger  for  God 
and  immortality  would  not  be  destroyed ;  and 
the  soul,  the  mother  of  all  traditions,  would 
build  its  shining  ladders,  behold  the  ascending 
and  descending  angels,  and  listen  once  more  to 
the  songs  of  the  Spirit. 

Religions  have  died,  but  the  spirit  of  worship 
survives.  Certain  forms  of  faith  went  down 
into  the  graves  of  ancient  empires,  but  the  realm 
of  faith  was  never  so  large  and  luminous  as  to- 
day. Science  is  showing  a  deeper  regard  for 
religion.  It  is  far  more  reverent,  and  in  closer 
sympathy  with  faith.  The  time  has  come  when 
scientific  minds  have  undertaken  the  study  of 
these  vital  phenomena  which  constitute  the 
main   current    of    human    progress.      The  whole 


30     CHRISTIAN irr,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

tendency  to-day  is  toward  a  worshipful  and  lov- 
ing trust  in  the  Eternal  Spirit/  Agnosticism  is 
not  so  unknowing  as  it  was  twenty  years  ago. 
"Each  act  of  scientific  examination,"  as  one  has 
said,  "but  reveals  the  opening  through  which 
shines  the  glory  of  the  eternal  majesty."  En- 
vironment includes  God,  the  chief  force  and 
factor  in  development.  God,  immortality,  the 
spiritual  origin,  and  direction  of  all  things — 
these  are  the  truths,  that  are  most  consonant 
with  our  present  state  of  knowledge.  .  The  ac- 
ceptance of  the  doctrine  of  evolution  has  enlarged 
the  domain  of  natural  theology  and  changed  its 
scope,  though  not  its  results.  Physical  and 
metaphysical  science  are  not  at  war.  They  are 
not  indifferent  to  each  other.  They  are  pursu- 
ing similar  ends.  It  is  not  only  true  that  science 
endeavors  to  think  God's  thoughts  after  Him, 
while  religion  endeavors  to  feel  God's  emotions 
after  Him,  but  it  is  also  true  that  science  is  be- 
coming religious,  and  religion  scientific. 

We  are  living  in  a  time  when  the  question 
asked  by  the  present  course  of  lectures  has  a 
peculiar  appropriateness.  Many  of  the  most  im- 
portant subjects  which  men  are  considering  at 
the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  are  either 
included  in  this  inquiry  or  suggested  by  it. 
Studies  in  Comparative  Theology  and  the  press- 
ing and  very  practical  problems  of  religious  effort 
are  closely  related  to  it.      Some  thoughtful  men, 

^Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  4. 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANirr.  31 

trained  in  the  philosophies  of  the  Orient,  are 
answering  our  inquiry  affirmatively  to  this  extent 
that  they  are  urging  and  promoting  ethical  re- 
forms which  follow  the  spirit  and  methods  of 
Christian  philanthropy.  Does  not  the  awakened 
and  expanded  intellect  of  India  and  Japan  look 
upon  Christendom  with  some  measure  of  grate- 
ful appreciation,  and  does  it  not  regard  Chris- 
tianity, as  represented  by  Christ  and  his  teach- 
ings with  a  growingly  favorable  mind? 

The  higher  principles  and  ideals  of  the  non- 
Christian  religions  touch  those  of  the  Christian 
Scriptures  at  certain  points,  although  not  always 
very  closely/  Good  results  might  follow  a  care- 
ful statement  of  these  principles,  common  to 
Christianity  and  each  of  the  non-Christian  sys- 
tems. By  a  comparison  of  these  different  state- 
ments, the  elements  common  to  all  could  be 
discovered.  This  residuum,  however,  would 
constitute  an  insufficient  basis  for  that  new,  uni- 
versal religion  which  a  few  idealists  imagine  is 
to  spring  from  this  common  content.  Scholars 
have  tried  in  vain  to  construct  an  artificial  lan- 
guage which  men  shall  adopt  and  use,  out  of 
the  best  elements  of  the  greatest  forms  of  human 
speech,  and  it  is  not  probable  that  a  universal 
religion  can  be  educed  out  of  the  elements  com- 
mon to  the  mightiest  forms  of  faith.  Religions 
whose  origins  are  known  have  not  been  manu- 
factured.     They   have   been   born   like   children. 

^Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  5. 


32    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

They  have  sprung  Hke  trees  from  seeds  or  roots  in 
the  past,  and  their  development  has  not  been 
mechanical,  but  vital  and  organic.  Dissection 
neither  discovers  nor  develops  life.  Reducing 
Christianity  and  the  non-Christian  faiths  to  their 
common  principles,  we  bring  the  highest  to  the 
level  of  the  lowest,  cut  each  faith  off  from  its 
history,  and  eliminate  from  each  at  least  some  of 
the  characteristic  elements  which  give  it  energy 
and  endurance.  The  ethical  and  philosophical 
remnant,  plus  the  dim  recognition  of  a  super- 
natural order,  cannot  be  considered  the  world- 
religion  for  which  mankind  is  supposed  to  be 
waiting.  Most  men  acquainted  with  the  history 
of  religions,  do  not  anticipate  the  rise  of  a  new 
faith  which,  gathering  the  best  elements  of  the 
others  into  a  grand  synthesis,  is  destined  to  sup- 
plant all  present  systems  of  belief  and  worship. 

Educated  minds  are  now  familiar  with  the 
leading  principles,  the  main  historic  develop- 
ments, the  present  working  forces,  and  the  chief 
moral  results  of  the  four  or  five  religions  of  the 
world  now  dividing  the  allegiance  of  its  inhab- 
itants. As  a  matter  of*  fact,  the  faiths  which  dis- 
pute with  Christianity  the  conquest  of  the  globe 
are  only  four:  the  Mohammedan,  the  Hindu, 
the  Confucian,  and  the  Buddhist.  I  believe  that 
Christianity  can  be  shoAvn  to  include  what  is 
best  in  the  ethnic  faiths,  to  have  elements 
which     make    it    supreme,    an    authoritativeness 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  I.,  Note  6. 


ASPECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  33 

which  makes  it  distinctive,  and  that,  when  de- 
veloped in  accordance  with  its  divine  ideas  and 
modified  to  meet  the  mental  and  other  necessi- 
ties of  different  nations,  it  will  yet  dominate 
with  its  beneficent  rule  the  entire  race.  It  has 
been  the  mission  of  the  greater  religions,  of 
those  which  are  vertebrate  with  organizing  truths, 
to  absorb  the  primitive,  the  unsystematized,  the 
aboriginal  faiths  of  the  world.  In  India,  as  the 
hill  tribes  and  the  tribes  of  the  jungle  have  be- 
come slightly  civilized,  they  have  gradually 
melted  their  rude  and  cruel  superstitions  into 
the  types  of  the  more  intellectual  religion.  They 
have  changed  their  modes  of  living  and  their 
ideas,  and  passed  into  Hinduism  "by  a  natural 
upward  transition,  which  has  led  them  to  adopt 
the  rituals  of  the  classes  immediately  above 
them."  We  know  that  Mohammedanism  is 
sweeping  away  the  barbarous  cults  of  central  and 
western  Africa;  that  Buddhism  in  its  wide  con- 
quests has  wrought  similar  works ;  while  Chris- 
tianity not  only  dethroned  the  gods  of  Olympus, 
but  has  also  annihilated  the  primitive  faiths  of 
many  of  the  savage  islands  of  the  Pacific. 

With  the  dividing  walls  of  nations  broken 
down  and  their  doors  of  exclusion  broken  in,  the 
great  religions  confront  each  other  to-day,  and, 
as  Principal  Grant  has  said  of  one  higher  faith 
meeting  another:  "Victory  cannot  be  expected 
to  incline  to  either  side  until  there  has  been  an 
intelligent  study  by  each  of  the  sources  of  the 


34     CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGIOX. 

other's  strength,  an  appreciation  of  the  spiritual 
and  social  needs  which  it  has  met,  and  an  ab- 
sorption by  the  one  that  has  most  inherent  ex- 
cellence and  power  of  assimilation,  of  all  in  the 
other  that  caused  it  to  be  accepted  and  retained 
for  centuries  by  millions  of  human  beings."  Of 
the  four  great  religions  which  meet  Christianity 
to-day,  he  adds  that  "they  have  proved  them- 
selves so  enduring,  and  so  suited  to  men  on  a 
great  scale  that,  if  Christianity  should  succeed 
in  absorbing  and  taking  the  place  of  one  of  them, 
it  would  be  a  more  crowning  demonstration  of 
its  superiority  than  was  its  triumph  over  the 
religions  of  Greece  and  Rome." 

I  come  as  a  representative  of  Jesus  Christ,  the 
greatest  cosmopolitan,  the  greatest  humanitarian 
of  all  history,  who,  in  His  disclosure  of  God  as 
the  universal  Father,  revealed  the  universal  prin- 
ciple of  human  unity.  His  God  is  "the  God  of 
all  men  and  nations,  the  God  who  is  revealed  in 
nature  and  history  alike."  I  do  not  speak  to 
you  as  a  man  of  another  race,  and  even  if  I  did 
I  should  feel  our  essential  oneness  as  members  of 
the  same  human  family.  But  we  are  of  the 
same  race.  Long  ages  ago  your  fathers  and 
mine  "were  brothers,  lived  under  the  same 
heaven,  watched  the  same  stars  rise  and  set, 
tilled  the  same  fields,  worshiped  the  same  gods." 
Culture,  wealth,  civilization  came  to  your  Aryan 
forefathers  when  the  ancestors  of  my  people 
were  cruel  savages,  dwelling  along  the  shores  of 


ASPECTS   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  35 

the  Elbe  and  the  Rhine.  If  to-day  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  race  is  in  the  foremost  ranks  of  civiHza- 
tion,  if  the  Teuton  is  now  a  leader  in  human 
progress,  it  is  because  there  came  to  him  "in  his 
brawny  and  untutored  youth  a  gentle  faith,  yet 
strong  as  gentle,  and  it  molded  him  with  its  soft 
yet  plastic  hands,  shaped  him  to  new  and  nobler 
purposes,  breathed  into  his  society  a  purer  spirit, 
larger  ambitions,  and  loftier  aims."  "He  knows 
himself  a  son  of  God,  a  brother  of  man,  a  free 
and  conscious  person,  sent  by  divine  love  to 
make  earth  happier,  by  divine  righteousness  to 
make  man  holier." 

We  believe  that  from  Christianity  has  sprung 
all  that  is  best  in  our  civilization,  and  so  far  as 
we  are  faithful  to  Christ,  our  leader,  we  are 
eager  that  all  men  should  share  its  blessings. 
But  you  will  not  appreciate  a  primary  and 
essential  truth  in  regard  to  Christianity  if  you 
think  of  it  for  a  moment  as  a  Western,  a  Eu- 
ropean, an  American  or  an  English  religion.  If 
it  must  be  described  geographically  it  is  Asiatic, 
and  from  Asia  its  light  has  illumined,  and  its 
gracious  power  has  molded,  the  Western  nations. 
But  the  word  Asiatic  is  misleading.  For  essen- 
tially it  is  universal;  it  is  that  which  not  only 
fits  the  spiritual  needs  of  all  races,  but  was  de- 
signed from  the  beginning,  and  was  proclaimed 
by  its  Founder,  for  the  spiritual  good  of  all  man- 
kind. 

But  what,  I   ask,    is  this  Christianity  of  which 


36    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

I  am  to  speak?  We  know  that  it  has  many 
forms  and  many  divisions.  In  these  lectures  it 
will  be  identified  not  with  a  part  of  Christendom, 
like  the  Greek  Church,  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church,  or  any  type  of  Protestantism,  but  rather 
with  that  in  which  they  all  agree:  common, 
catholic,  historic  Christianity,  the  faith  delivered 
once  for  all  in  apostolic  times  unto  the  Christian 
saints,  but  not  delivered  as  a  perfect  jewel 
admitting  of  no  change  or  growth,  but  rather  as 
a  celestial  seed  capable  of  indefinite  expansion 
and  wide  variation.  Historic  Christianity,  so  far 
as  its  fundamental  truths  and  facts  are  concerned, 
includes  the  faith  in  God,  the  Father  and  Creator; 
in  Jesus  Christ,  His  only  Son,  the  Redeemer 
of  the  soul  through  His  life,  example,  teachings, 
death,  and  resurrection;  in  the  Holy  Spirit,  or 
the  Lord  of  life  and  sanctifier  of  the  soul;  in  a 
Holy  Universal  Church  of  all  believers;  in  per- 
sonal resurrection,  and  conscious  immortality. 
There  have  been  Christian  developments  outside 
of  these  limits.  Noble  characters  have  been 
shaped  by  Christian  truth,  who  have  not  accepted 
in  its  fullness  the  historic  faith.  But  I  am  not 
dealing  with  exceptions,  but  with  the  rule.  Chris- 
tianity is  a  majestic  growth  from  the  seed  planted 
in  Palestine  by  Christ  and  his  Apostles.  The 
truths  and  forces  which  have  made  Christen- 
dom are  centered  in  Him  whom  the  Church 
reveres  as  the  Messiah  of  Israel,  the  Son  of 
God,  the    Divine    Redeemer,    incarnate  in  Jesus 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITY.  37 

of  Nazareth  for  the  redemption  of  men.  Of 
course,  Christianity  cannot  be  regarded  as  merely 
the  theological  teachings  and  historical  propo- 
sitions of  any  Christian  creed.  It  must  also  be 
thought  of  as  the  spirit  pervading  these.  As 
Christ  created  Christianity,  we  must  know  Him 
in  order  to  understand  what  He  created;  His 
conception  of  God  as  Father,  gracious,  merciful, 
and  providing  propitiation;  His  conception  of 
Himself  as  the  Mediator  and  Redeemer;  of  men 
as  children  of  God,  whose  primary  obligations 
are  the  filial  spirit  toward  Him,  and  the  fraternal 
spirit  toward  each  other;  of  worship  as  spiritual 
and  independent  of  priests  and  sacred  places;  of 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  as  a  society  founded  to 
universalize  Christian  ideas.  We  believe  that 
this,  the  common,  historic  Christianity  has  in  it 
the  elements  and  forces  which  make  it  fit  to  be- 
come the  world-religion,  and  which,  for  that  rea- 
son, will  give  to  it  ultimate  acceptance  through- 
out the  earth. 

And  what  fitter  time  was  ever  known  for  such 
discussions  and  comparisons  as  are  involved  in 
our  fundamental  proposition?  The  investigation 
required  may  now  be  conducted  without  mis- 
leading ignorance,  without  acrimony,  in  the 
spirit  of  perfect  fairness,  and  with  genuine  and 
generous  appreciation  of  the  elements  of  truth 
and  goodness,  discoverable  in  each  of  the  lead- 
ing historic  faiths.  In  a  recent  article  in  the 
Deutsche  Rundschau    of    Berlin,    Professor    Max 


38     CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Miiller  describes  each  religion  as  going  its 
own  way,  so  convinced  of  its  own  and  only 
beatifical  power  that  it  hardly  looks  at  others, 
and  can  only  with  difficulty  suppress  a  smile  of 
self-content  when  it  is  asked  to  put  itself  within 
the  same  line  and  order  with  the  other  religions. 
This  description  may  express  the  general  feeling 
of  the  past,  and  the  prevailing  feeling  of  multi- 
tudes to-day;  but  surely  we  have  witnessed  the 
beginnings  of  a  truer  understanding  among  those 
who  variously  represent  the  spiritual  forces  of 
the  earth.  And  there  are  multitudes  of  Chris- 
tians, profoundly  loyal  to  Jesus  Christ,  who  have 
expressed  a  generous  appreciation,  not  only  of 
the  truths  contained  in  the  Sacred  Books  of  the 
East,  but  also  of  the  devoted  lives  of  many  who 
have  not  known  the  historic  Christ,  or  who  have 
been  blessed  by  Him  indirectly  rather  than 
directly — that  is  through  lunar,  rather  than  solar 
radiance.'  A  few  years  ago,  in  the  Palace  of  De- 
light outside  the  fortress  of  Acre,  there  died  a 
famous  Persian  sage,  named  Beha  Allah,  the 
"Glory  of  God," — the  head  of  that  vast  reform 
party  of  Persian  Moslems  who  accept  the  New 
Testament  as  the  word  of  God,  and  Christ  as 
the  deliverer  of  men,  regarding  all  peoples  as 
one,  and  all  men  as  brethren, — who  said  to  a 
Cambridge  scholar  "that  all  nations  should  be- 
come one  in  faith,  and  all  men  as  brothers;  that 
the  bonds  of  affection  and  unity  between  the 
'Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  7. 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  39 

sons  of  men  should  be  strengthened;  that 
diversity  of  religions  should  cease,  and  differences 
of  race  be  annulled;  what  harm  is  there  in  this? 
Yet  so  it  shall  be.  These  fruitless  strifes,  these 
ruinous  wars  shall  pass  away,  and  the  Most  Great 
Peace  shall  come.  Do  not  you  in  Europe  need 
this  also?  Let  not  a  man  glory  in  this,  that  he 
loves  his  country ;  let  him  rather  glory  in  this, 
that  he  loves  his  kind."  Do  not  such  Christian 
sentiments  as  were  spoken  by  this  Babi  saint 
indicate  that  loving  hearts  are  finding  each  other 
out  and  reaching  forth  their  friendly  hands,  now 
that  Heaven  is  calling  to  the  truce  of  God?^ 

A  fundamental  principle  of  the  Parliament  of 
Religions  was  toleration,  and  those  who  accept 
the  principles  of  the  Parliament  are  champions 
of  toleration  in  its  truest  and  widest  sense.  The 
records  of  religious  bigotry  and  persecution  are 
probably  the  blackest  and  reddest  pages  in  the 
past  history  of  our  race.  The  wars,  hatreds  and 
inhumanities  attributable  to  the  intolerant  spirit 
in  sincere  men,  men  who  worshiped  their  own 
opinions  more  than  the  divine  spirit  of  love  and 
mercy,  have  made  the  very  name  of  religion  an 
offense  to  certain  classes  of  unbelieving  minds. 
All  races  and  all  the  great  faiths  have  an  evil 
record  to  be  ashamed  of  in  this  regard.  We 
hope  that  the  Parliament  is  a  signal  to  the 
twentieth  century  that  the  persecuting  ages  are 
over  or  must  speedily  come  to  an  end.     Tolera- 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  8. 


40     CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

tion  means  among  other  things  that  men  are  to 
be  defended  in  their  right  to  worship  God 
according  to  the  dictates  of  their  own  con- 
sciences, without  fear  or  molestation.  It  means 
that  the  Jew  may  become  a  Christian,  or  the 
Christian  a  proselyte  to  Judaism,  without  suffer- 
ing social  or  religious  punishment.  It  means 
that  the  American  may  become  a  Buddhist,  and 
that  the  Japanese,  Chinese  or  Hindu  may  be- 
come a  Christian  or  a  Mohammedan  without  pass- 
ing through  any  earthly  Inferno.''' 

The  days  of  persecution  are  drawing  to  an 
end,  and  the  day  of  co-operation  and  friendly 
intercourse  has  dawned ;  there  is  in  most  lands, 
and  I  am  persuaded  here,  also,  augmenting  toler- 
ation of  individual  conviction  and  an  increasing 
spirit  of  fraternity.  I  believe  that  the  unity  of 
mankind  is  a  foremost  thought  in  the  modern 
world,  and  that  the  tendencies  toward  unifica- 
tion in  morals,  laws,  commerce  and  scientific 
conceptions  are  stronger  than  ever  before. 

Ethical  unification  is  happily  becoming  more 
and  more  apparent.  The  highest  minds  in  every 
faith,  when  they  have  expressed  themselves  in 
each  other's  presence,  have  condemned  injustice 
and  oppression  in  nations,  the  rapacity  and 
cruelty  of  strength  in  dealing  with  weakness. 
They  have  declared  for  righteousness,  purity  and 
humanity.  And  they  have  perceived  and 
af^rmed  that  morality  is  not  something  artificial 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  9. 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITI .  41 

and  fanciful,  is  not  a  matter  of  gesture,  and 
ceremonial  and  national  usage.  It  is  not  con- 
cerned with  the  mere  externals  and  unessentials 
of  life.  It  is  something  real;  that  is,  spiritual 
and  vital;  it  belongs  to  the  heart  and  conscience. 
These  higher  minds  exclaim  with  the  old 
prophet,  "What  doth  the  Lord  require  of  thee 
except  to  do  justice,  love  mercy,  and  to  walk 
humbly  with  thy  God?"  But  is  the  unification 
to  stop  with  ethics?  Is  it  not  to  include  the 
domain  of  religion?  If  "all  ideas  of  a  family  or 
national  God  have  disappeared  from  the  minds 
of  civilized  men,"  may  not  the  idea  of  a  merely 
national  religion  also  disappear?  If  human 
brotherhood  is  universal,  why  may  not  the  wor- 
ship of  the  common  Father  through  a  common 
Mediator  and  Saviour  become  universal?  With 
men  living  under  such  varying  conditions  there 
will  always  remain  diversities  wide  enough  to 
satisfy  the  poet,  the  economist,  and  the  phi- 
losopher. But,  since  all  men  are  essentially 
alike,  that  is,  since  their  spiritual  needs  and 
aptitudes  are  fundamentally  the  same,  why 
should  they  not  all  have  access  to  the  best  that 
God  has  given?  If  Mohammedanism  or  Hindu- 
ism, if  Buddhism  or  Christianity  has  the  more 
perfect  revelation  of  truth,  is  richer  in  its  dis- 
closures of  God,  and  has  organized,  or  brought 
together  these  truths  and  revelations  into  the 
most  harmonious  and  effective  working  order, 
why  should  not  the  more   favored   religion,  espe- 


42     CHRISTTANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

cially  if  it  be  one  marked  by  essential  complete- 
ness, supernatural  authority,  evident  finality  and 
absolute  perfection  in  its  central  Personage, 
become  the  universal  faith? 

One  reason  for  the  gentler  spirit  now  apparent 
on  the  part  of  Christendom  is  a  deeper  love  of 
all  truth,  and  a  perception  that  scattered  rays  of 
truth  have  reached  every  nation.  There  are  in- 
tuitions of  the  Divine,  clear  distinctions  between 
good  and  evil,  hopes  of  immortality,  and  percep- 
tions of  a  superhuman  government,  entering  into 
nearly  all  the  religions.  In  claiming  that  Chris- 
tianity is  fitted  for  the  whole  race,  and  will  be 
universal,  we  do  not  deny  that  Mohammedan- 
ism, for  example,  had  good  reasons  for  spring- 
ing into  life,  that  it  rebuked  and  chastised  a 
corrupted  church,  and  that  it  may  have  sur- 
passed Christendom,  at  certain  times  and  places, 
in  its  application  of  ethical  truths.  Christian 
scholars  confess  that  the  doctrine  of  human 
equality  has  occasionally  "received  practical  ex- 
emplifications in  Islam,  which  were  sadly  want- 
ing in  the  parallel  region  of  Christian  practice." 
They  point  us  to  "the  Caliph  Omar,  leading  his 
camel  while  his  slave  rides,  the  prophet's 
daughter,  Fatimah,  taking  her  turn  at  the  mill 
with  her  own  slaves,"  as  "specimens  of  the 
scrupulous  observance  in  general  paid  to  the  in- 
junctions of  the  prophet."  Among  the  followers 
of  Mohammed  are  spiritual  aspirations  after  a 
life  of  purity,  and  struggles,  not  always  defeated, 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  43 

against  the  lower  nature.  We  know  that  the 
Golden  Rule,  stated  negatively  in  the  Confucian 
writings,  is  found  also  in  the  positive  form  in 
the  Hindu  Shastras,  and  that  centuries  before 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the  Chinese  sage,  the 
mystic  and  thoughtful  Laoste,  taught  the  duty 
of  blessing  those  who  injure  us.  A  true  Chris- 
tian theology  is  not  abashed,  but  rather  glorified, 
by  such  evidences  of  the  working  of  God's 
Spirit.  Archbishop  Trench  has  instructed  us 
that  we  are  not  unduly  magnifying  the  light  of 
nature  by  these  concessions  to  truth,  but  are 
only  affirming  that  the  Light  which  enlighteneth 
every  man  has  given  some  glimpses  of  His  beams 
to  all,  and  that  "in  recognizing  this  brightness 
we  are  ascribing  honor  to  Him  and  not  to  them — 
glorifying  the  grace  of  God,  and  not  the  virtues 
of  man." 

Furthermore,  let  us  not  forget  that  the 
severity  of  Jesus  Christ  blazed  out  against  the 
Pharisee,  and  not  against  the  Pagan.  "He  was 
royal  hearted"  it  has  been  said,  "in  the  recog- 
nition which  He  gave  to  ignorant  goodness," 
like  that  of  those  who  ministered  unknowingly 
unto  Him  in  the  least  of  His  brethren,  or  that 
of  the  man  who  was  casting  out  devils  in  His 
name.  We  are  so  far  from  embodying  the  per- 
fect truth,  so  far  from  realizing  ideal  Chris- 
tianity, that  the  temper  of  generous  charity  tow- 
ard men  whose  heavenly  possessions  seem  to  us 
less    than   our   own   is   pre-eminently  becoming. 


44     CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

We  believe  that  the  perfect  Christianity  is  the 
mind,  and  heart,  and  life  of  Christ,  but  we  who 
have  so  much,  are  so  imperfect  both  in  our  ap- 
prehensions and  in  our  lives,  and  those  who 
appear  to  us  to  have  less  are  at  times  so  mani- 
festly better  than  their  creeds  that  our  discrimi- 
nating age,  is  one  in  which  "the  strife  of  warring 
dogmatisms  "  is  happily  lessening. 

Comparative  Theology  makes  our  apprehen- 
sion of  God  juster,  our  perceptions  of  His  work- 
ings broader,  by  seeing  in  the  ethnic  faiths,  "a 
part  of  that  divine  discipline  by  which  the  race 
of  man  has  been  tutored,  and  trained  for  a 
higher  life  and  fuller  revelation."  "Hebrew 
prophecy  does  not  claim  to  be  the  only  genuine 
prophecy.  The  Old  Testament  Scriptures  repre- 
sent prophecy  as  extending  beyond  the  range  of 
the  chosen  people  in  Melchizedek,  Jethro,  and 
Balaam.  It  is  not  necessary  in  the  interest  of 
the  Christian  religion  to  insist  that  God  left  all 
other  nations  except  Israel  without  religious 
guidance."  The  more  the  leading  religions  are 
studied  in  their  genesis,  their  original  teachings, 
and  in  their  relations  to  the  loftiest  spirits  who 
were  influenced  by  them,  the  more  beauty,  truth 
and  good  are  discovered  in  them.  We  believe 
that  Christianity  is  to  supersede  all  other  faiths, 
"not  by  excluding,  but  by  including  the  ele- 
ments of  truth  which  each  contains."  Some 
Christians  have  been  startled  in  discovering  how 
much  of  spiritual  verity  may  be  found  outside  of 


ASPECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  45 

Christendom.  Still,  in  the  end,  with  Sir  Monier 
Williams,  they  have  been  more  profoundly  im- 
pressed with  the  supremacy  and  sufficiency  of 
the  Christian  faith.  And,  furthermore,  such 
studies  as  we  are  pursuing,  will  give  us  not  only 
the  perception,  but  also  the  feeling  of  the  uni<- 
of  mankind. 

In  claiming  and  seeking  universal  acceptance 
Christianity  finds  itself  opposed  by  the  claim, 
and  efforts  of  Buddhism  and  Islam.  Hinduism 
can  hardly  be  taken  out  of  the  category  of 
national  religions.  The  efforts  of  a  few  Hindu 
scholars,  to  secure  a  general  recognition  of  the 
worth  which  they  find,  for  example,  in  the  Ve- 
danta  philosophy,  do  not  properly  place  Hindu- 
ism in  the  ranks  of  the  missionary  faiths,  seeking 
by  zealous  propagandism  to  gain  universal  ac- 
ceptance. But  Buddhism  and  Islam  are  in  very 
different  degrees,  missionary  in  spirit,  and  every 
missionary  religion  has  in  its  heart  the  hope  of 
universal  supremacy.  Mohammedanism  has 
sought  to  bring  men  under  the  dominion  of  its 
great  formulary.  And  it  presents  to-day  some 
aspects  of  universalism,  although  it  seems  to  us 
defective  in  meeting  all  the  needs  of  the  human 
heart.  But  when  the  representatives  of  Islam 
coming  all  the  way  from  the  center  of  Africa  and 
the  borders  of  China,  after  their  "long  travel 
under  solemn  suns,"  meet  in  Mecca,  the  end  of 
their  holy  pilgrimage,  a  new  world-sense  arises 
or  is  strengthened   in   their  devout  souls  such  as 


46    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

came  to  many  at  the  opening  of  the  World's 
First  ParHament  of  Religions.  "  It  is  this,"  as 
one  has  said,  "which  has  stimulated  the  devo- 
tion of  susceptible  and  imaginative  minds,  it  is 
this  which  communicates  to  all  Mohammedans 
an  inspiring  sensation  of  the  universality  of  their 
religion,  and  exhibits  with  a  form  they  can  ap- 
preciate the  unity  of  all  believers."  Buddhism 
claims  to  be  a  world-wide  religion,  and  thus 
stands  in  vivid  contrast  with  the  Hinduism  out 
of  which  it  sprang.  Gautama's  extrication  of 
his  new  enthusiasm  for  mankind  from  the  grasp 
of  the  Brahmanic  priesthood,  has  been  compared 
with  the  work  of  Saul  of  Tarsus,  in  saving  Chris- 
tianity from  sinking  into  a  Jewish  sect.  In  the 
present  unity  of  modern  civilization,  the  so- 
called  universal  religions  are  using  similar  meth- 
ods and  instruments,  in  diffusing  their  ideas. 
We  are  told  that  Mohammedans  are  now  em- 
ploying the  press  instead  of  the  sword.  "News- 
papers in  Constantinople  are  exhorting  the  faith- 
ful to  send  forth  missionaries,  to  fortify  Africa 
against  the  whiskey  and  gun-powder  of  Christian 
commerce,  by  proclaiming  the  higher  ethical 
principles  of  the  Koran,"  And  Buddhism  in 
Japan  has  instituted  "Societies  of  Buddhist 
Endeavor,  Young  Men's  Buddhist  Associations, 
well-equipped  schools  for  their  rising  priesthood, 
girls'  schools,  orphanages,  a  contemplated  school 
for  nurses,  and  a  hospital  in  Tokio."  It  has 
been  the  habit  of  Buddhism   in   the  spirit  of   the 


ASPECTS   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  47 

all-appropriating  Hindu  system  out  of  which  it 
came,  to  borrow  whatever  appeared  that  might 
be  useful,  and  we  are  not  surprised  that  "in  the 
fifteenth  century  a  reformed  Buddhist  Church  in 
Thibet  adopted  the  whole  organization  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church,  and  so  we  find  there 
pope,  cardinal,  prelate,  bishops,  abbots,  priests, 
monks,  nuns;  with  the  ritual  of  infant  baptism, 
confirmation,  ordination  and  investiture,  masses 
for  the  dead,  litanies,  chants  and  antiphonies, 
rosaries,  chaplets,  candles,  holy  water,  proces- 
sions, pilgrimages,  saints'  days  and  fast  days." 

But,  whatever  may  be  justly  said  of  the  world- 
hunger  of  the  faiths  of  Buddha  and  Mohammed, 
no  one  doubts  that  Christianity  not  only  seeks 
to  become  world-wide,  but  must  do  so  by  the 
very  law  of  its  being.  When  Christians  are 
sometimes  asked  to  cease  their  efforts  in  extend- 
ing the  knowledge  of  Jesus  Christ  as  the  Divine 
Saviour  of  men,  and  to  confine  their  labors  to 
works  of  philanthropy  and  social  reform,  they 
are  requested  to  refuse  obedience  to  their  Su- 
preme Commander,  to  whom  they  have  pledged 
their  loyalty,  and  they  are  asked  also  to  throw 
away  the  means,  by  which  experience  has  led 
them  to  think  that  they  can  best  serve  the  moral 
and  social  progress  of  men.  Canon  Gore  has 
said  of  Christ,  "He  founded  a  catholic  religion 
capable  of  infinite  adaptation  in  different  so- 
cieties, but  appealing  to  the  manhood  which 
does    not    change,"  and    Christianity   renounces 


48     CHRIST  FAN  IT  }\   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

itself  and  its  Divine  Master  whenever  it  curbs 
its  out-reaching  activities,  and  hides  its  heavenly 
light  under  any  ethnic  bushel.  As  we  open  the 
New  Testament  literature,  we  find  that  the  idea 
of  a  world-wide  conquest  lies  at  the  foundation 
of  the  Christian  religion.  The  apostles  were  to 
make  disciples  of  all  nations,  and  were  to  be  wit- 
nesses of  Christ,  to  the  uttermost  parts  of  the 
earth.  The  world  of  their  thought  and  knowl- 
edge may  have  been  restricted  to  the  Roman 
Empire,  even  as  the  world  of  the  Buddhist  em- 
peror Asoka,  who  deemed  himself  a  universal 
king,  was  confined  to  India,  and  the  world  which 
Confucius  and  Laotze  surveyed  was  bounded 
by  China.  But,  in  the  expanding  thought  of 
Christendom  all  national  limits  have  disap- 
peared. It  sees  in  Jesus  Christ  a  redeeming 
King  who  has  made  a  propitiation  for  the  sins 
of  universal  humanity.  "And  the  coming  of 
Christ  coincided,  under  Divine  providence,  with 
the  breaking  down  of  national  barriers,  and  the 
establishment  of  a  cosmopolitan  system  of  poli- 
tics and  culture  under  the  first  Roman  emperors; 
and  so,  Christianity  was  able  to  leave  the  narrow 
field  of  Old  Testament  development,  and  be- 
come a  religion,  not  for  one  nation,  but  for  all 
mankind." 

But  the  universalism  of  Christianity  cannot  be 
understood  and  appreciated  apart  from  its  his- 
toric background.  The  Christian  faith  is  the 
outgrowth  and  culmination   of  Judaism;   its  doc- 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITY.  49 

trine  of  a  universal  divine  kingdom  is  a  republi- 
cation of  the  teachings  of  Israel's  greater  proph- 
ets. Whatever  may  be  justly  said  of  the  earlier 
narrowness  of  conception  which  regarded  Israel's 
Jehovah  as  a  tribal  Deity,  there  is  a  grand  uni- 
versalism  discoverable  in  the  purposes  that  run 
through  Hebrew  history.  In  Abraham  all  na- 
tions were  to  be  blessed,  and  when  he  returned 
from  the  slaughter  of  the  kings,  he  was  met  by 
a  priest  of  the  most  high  God,  the  King  of 
Salem,  the  representative  of  that  natural  religion 
which  has  always  been  universal,  because  the 
foundation  on  which  special  revelations  have 
been  built.  In  Melchizedek,  appearing  in  the 
far  twilight  of  Hebrew  tradition,  we  behold  a 
priest  of  the  Most  High  to  whom  even  Abraham 
gave  deference  and  a  tithe  of  his  spoils.  Here 
was  truly  a  sympathetic  recognition  of  the  world 
outside  the  line  of  the  chosen  people.  And, 
later,  we  find  the  exiled  Moses  sojourning  with 
the  priest  of  Midian,  evidently  beyond  the  pale 
of  the  nation  of  Jehovah,  and  from  him  Moses 
received  counsel.  And  the  writer  of  the  book 
of  Job  pictures  for  us  another  saint  chosen  for 
special  trial  and  honor  outside  of  Judaism,  a 
disciple  of  the  true  God  on  whose  sensitive  heart 
fell  the  pure  white  light  of  heaven,  unimpeded 
by  any  prisms  of  later  error  which  have  broken 
into  many-colored  radiance  the  celestial  beam. 

And,  in  the  midst  of   Israel's  life,  there  grew 
up  into  sublime  proportions  one   of  the  noblest 


50    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

ideas  that  ever  blossomed  on  the  stem  of  Time, 
the  idea  of  the  whole  earth  as  a  single,  divine, 
realm,  a  world-embracing  commonwealth.  And, 
though  the  Assyrian  and  the  Chaldean,  the 
Medo-Persian,  the  Greek  and  the  Roman 
harassed  and  smote  down  Israel,  he  never  gave 
up  his  magnificent  and  imperial  hope.  He  set 
his  faith  to  music,  and  gave  in  the  expectant 
Psalms  the  choicest  books  of  devotion  for  all 
the  centuries,  fitted  to  the  coming  kingdom  in 
every  period  and  latitude.  As  those  majestic 
statesmen,  the  prophets,  lifted  their  voices  in 
rebuke  of  Israel's  sin,  the  minds  of  men  were 
directed  to  the  coming  age  with  increasing  hope 
that  the  prophetic  ideals  were  yet  to  be  realized 
in  a  perfect  kingdom.  Amos,  the  champion  of 
a  down-trodden  peasantry;  Hosea,  the  prophet 
of  mercy;  Isaiah,  beholding  the  true  kingdom 
centered  in  Jerusalem,  administered  by  an  ideal 
priest  of  the  house  of  David,  and  yet  to  be  real- 
ized in  an  endless  and  boundless  reign  of  knowl- 
edge and  righteousness;  conceiving  the  king- 
dom, as  centered  in  the  righteous  servant  of 
Jehovah,  who  was  to  come,  and  realized  through 
His  vicarious  sufferings;  Jeremiah,  seeing  the 
kingdom  in  the  heart  of  the  individual,  and  not 
dependent  on  holy  land  or  holy  temple;  how 
richly  all  of  these  contributed  to  the  literature 
of  the  celestial  commonwealth,  and  to  the  exalta- 
tion of  Israel ! 

It  is  little  wonder,  then,  that   Israel  identified 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITy.  5 1 

the  coming  of  the  Messiah,  and  the  establish- 
ment of  His  kingdom  with  the  Hfting  up  of  his 
own  race  and  capital.  It  is  no  wonder  that  he 
cherished  such  hopes  as  the  English  poet  has  put 
into  his  sounding  rhymes: — 

"Rise,  crowned  with  light,  imperial  Salem,  rise! 
Exalt  thy  towery  head  and  lift  thy  eyes! 
See  barbarous  nations  at  thy  gates  attend, 
Walk  in  thy  light  and  in  thy  temples  bend; 
See  thy  bright  altars  thronged  with  prostrate  kings. 
And  heaped  with  products  of  Sabean  springs!  " 

In  their  material  splendors  these  words  sug- 
gest the  glory  of  the  Messiah's  final  victories. 
But,  when  the  meek  teacher  of  Galilee  appeared, 
while  He  claimed  all  the  prophetic  ideas  of  the 
kingdom,  He  purified  them,  and  founded  a  new 
society  whose  principles  ran  athwart  the  gross 
nationalism  so  dear  to  Israel.  Breaking  away 
from  the  so-called  kingdom  of  Heaven,  repre- 
sented by  the  Jewish  state,  He  launched  a  new 
and  better  commonwealth,  giving  it  laws  in  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount,  describing  its  spiritual, 
and  hence  pervasive,  character  in  a  score  of 
parables,  placing  its  sovereignty  in  the  soul,  and 
lifting  it  out  of  the  ancient  provincialism  which 
was  yet  great  enough  to  dream  of  a  universal 
commonwealth  of  God.      His  was 

"A  new  established  state 
Greater  than  states  and  governing  all  states; 
Which  should  not  have  for  boundaries  the  seas, 
Mountains  or  streams,  nor  any  border  line 
By  bloody  sword-point  traced;  and  should  not  have 
Armies  nor  tributes,  treasuries  nor  palms, 


52    CHRIST/AN/TV,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

But,  overleaping  races,  realms  and  tongues. 
Thrones,  zones  and  dominations,  lands  and  seas. 
Should  clasp  in  one  mild  confine  all  those  hearts 
Which  seek  and  love  the  Light,  and  have  the  light 
Shining  from  secret  Heaven,  by  Him  revealed, 
First  born  of  Heaven,  first  soul  of  human  souls 
That  touched  the  top  of  manhood." 

From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  Christ's  life 
we  catch  glimpses  of  the  universal  purpose  and 
character  of  His  Messianic  work.  At  His  cradle 
the  representatives  of  the  old  star-worshipers  of 
Persia  are  drawn  to  His  feet,  and  in  the  last 
week  of  His  ministry  in  the  temple,  the  Greeks 
who  represented  the  universal  spirit  of  inquiry 
and  of  reason,  the  Greeks,  in  whose  brain  was 
the  civilization  of  the  modern  world  on  its  intel- 
lectual side,  desired  to  see  Him.  And,  while 
He  went  first  to  the  -lost  sheep  of  the  house  of 
Israel,  His  ministry  was  largely  given  to  the 
semi-Gentile  populations  of  the  North.  He  even 
preached  to  the  Samaritans,  and  once  He  de- 
parted to  the  Tyrian  coasts,  and  discovered  a 
great  heart  of  trustful  love  in  a  Syro-Phoenician 
woman.  It  was  of  a  Roman  centurion  that  He 
said:  "Verily  I  have  not  found  such  faith,  no 
not  even  in  Israel,"  adding  that  many  "shall 
come  from  the  East  and  the  West,  and  shall  sit 
down  with  Abraham  and  Isaac  and  Jacob  in  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven."  It  was  a  Samaritan  that 
Jesus  chose  to  illustrate  what  neighborly  kind- 
ness is.  It  was  an  African  who  bore  His  cross 
over  the  shuddering  rocks  of  Golgotha;  it  was  a 


ASPECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  53 

Roman  captain  who,  seeing  the  dying  Redeemer, 
cried  out,  "This  truly  is  God's  son."  And 
upon  His  cross  Pilate  placed  a  superscription 
which  proclaimed  with  significant  prophecy  the 
Nazarene's  universal  kingship,  for  it  was  written 
out  in  three  languages,  the  Hebrew,  the  old  and 
sacred  speech  belonging  to  a  people  of  marvelous 
genius  in  the  realm  of  religion ;  the  Greek,  the 
language  of  a  race  which  still  rules  the  intel- 
lectual and  artistic  world,  the  language  in  which 
Homer  sang,  and  Plato  taught,  and  Demosthenes 
fulmined,  in  which  Paul  and  St.  Chrysostom 
were  to  preach;  and  the  Latin,  the  language  of 
the  masterful  and  militant  Roman,  in  which 
Virgil  and  Horace  had  already  written,  in  which 
Tacitus  was  to  compose  his  histories,  and  Ter- 
tullian  his  sermons,  and  St.  Augustine  his  ex- 
positions of  Christian  philosophy  culminating  in 
the  Civitas  Dei ;  Latin,  the  sacred  language  of 
Europe  for  more  than  a  thousand  years. 

Thus  the  command  which  was  given  by  the 
risen  Jesus  on  the  Mount  of  Galilee,  "Go  ye 
into  all  the  world  and  preach  the  Gospel  to  every 
creature,"  appears  in  the  light  of  the  preceding 
history,  as  the  brilliant  heavenly  flower  of  long 
ages  of  development  and  preparation.  Salva- 
tion, according  to  His  teaching,  was  of  the  Jews; 
from  them  came  the  world's  Saviour,  and  with 
them  was  the  highest  and  purest  spiritual  knowl- 
edge. But  the  stream  of  salvation  was  not  nar- 
rowed to  Judaism,  or,  if  seemingly  thus  confined, 


54    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

it  was  only  making  ready  for  the  wider  diffusion 
of  God's  grace.  His  providence  is  like  the  river 
Abana,  the  modern  Barada,  the  river  of  Damas- 
cus. High  up  among  the  perennial  snows  of  the 
anti-Lebanon,  a  thousand  little  rills  are  born  of 
the  kisses  of  the  sun,  and  roll  their  sparkling 
and  musical  waters  down  the  sides  of  the  great 
mountain-wall.  These  are  mingled  with  torrents 
that  rush  from  natural  fountains,  bursting  from 
beneath  the  shelter  of  mighty  rocks,  or  flowing 
from  the  bosom  of  some  temple-covered  cavern, 
all  uniting  in  one  narrow  channel,  along  whose 
course  a  profuse  and  wonderful  vegetation  springs 
up,  in  striking  contrast  with  the  barrenness  of 
the  hillsides  through  which  it  passes,  willows, 
poplars,  hawthorn,  walnut,  growing  along  this 
rushing  volume  of  crystal  water.  Such  was  the 
spiritual,  and  best  life  of  old  Judea,  as  contrasted 
with  the  surrounding  world,  a  river  of  water  of 
life  pouring  down  through  the  rocky  wilderness 
of  death.  But,  take  your  stand,  as  it  was  my 
joy  to  do  one  April  morning,  upon  some  low 
spur  of  the  anti-Lebanon,  where  you  can  watch 
the  eastward-rushing  stream.  Soon  it  leaves  the 
last  cleft  in  the  mountain-wall,  it  touches  the 
plain  of  Damascus,  and  then  spreads  for  thirty 
miles  around  a  wilderness  of  verdure  that  bursts 
on  the  view  like  a  sapphire  island  floating  in  a 
desert  sea.  As  far  as  the  eye  can  reach,  the 
fertilizing  stream  has  covered  the  sand  wastes 
with   an   earthly  paradise,  and  there  on  the  hori- 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITY.  55 

zon  lies  the  crown  jewel  of  the  Orient,  Damas- 
cus, the  Queen  of  the  East,  embedded  in  roses 
and  luxuriant  in  a  wilderness  of  fruits,  with 
minarets  like  priestesses  in  prayer,  stretching 
their  white  arms  heavenward,  while  the  mount- 
ain-born stream,  cut  now  into  seven  channels, 
rolls  beneath  her  streets  its  cooling  tides,  which 
bathe  the  feet  of  little  children  in  the  precincts 
of  many  a  sacred  mosque,  and  gurgle  in  dia- 
mond fountains,  feeding  the  roots  of  orange- 
trees  in  the  courts  of  many  a  stately  palace.  So 
the  stream  of  Providence,  born  of  a  thousand 
rills  of  mercy  which  converged  into  the  channel 
of  Judaism,  left  that  narrow  river-bed  at  the 
command  of  Jesus  to  fertilize  the  desert  world, 
rushing  not  eastward  but  every  whither,  through 
wider  and  fairer  gardens  than  those  of  Damas- 
cus, while  on  the  horizon  ever  appear  the  towers 
and  shining  walls  of  the  new  Jerusalem,  the  uni- 
versal spiritual  commonwealth,  the  city  of  our 
God. 

Within  seventy  years  from  the  day  when 
Jesus  gave  their  marching  orders  to  His  little 
band  of  followers,  the  messengers  of  salvation 
had  penetrated  every  civilized  land  from  Babylon 
to  Spain.  The  feet  of  Christian  apostles,  shod 
with  the  preparation  of  the  Gospel,  had  followed 
the  track  of  Cyrus,  Alexander  and  Caesar,  the 
great  conquerors  of  the  East.  The  strategic 
points  of  the  Roman  world  had  been  occupied 
by    the    soldiers    of    the    Kingdom    of    Heaven. 


56    CHRlSTIANITi;  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Antioch,  the  Paris  of  the  Orient;  Ephesus,  the 
most  illustrious  of  Ionian  cities;  Alexandria, 
the  chief  seaport  of  ancient  commerce;  Athens, 
"the  eye  of  Greece,  mother  of  arts  and  elo- 
quence;" Corinth,  the  luxurious,  and  Rome  the 
imperial  center  from  whose  golden  milestone  in 
the  Forum  outstretched,  like  the  spikes  of  a  fan, 
the  lines  of  those  military  roads  which  went 
forth  into  all  the  earth,  these  great  capitals  of 
the  old  Roman  World  had  heard  some  accents 
of  the  Gospel.  The  life-giving  word  had  been 
preached  by  the  pyramids  and  bronzed  obelisks 
of  Egypt,  in  the  palaces  of  the  Cssars,  and  in 
most  of  the  chief  cities  that  sentineled  the  shores 
of  the  Mediterranean  Sea. 

From  the  time  when  Jesus  commissioned  His 
followers  to  go  into  all  the  world,  there  took 
possession  of  the  Church,  or  at  least  of  its  spir- 
itual leaders,  the  conviction  that  men,  who  are 
brothers  by  creation,  were  yet  to  constitute  a 
universal  commonwealth  under  the  sovereignty 
of  God.  Against  the  thoughts  and  plans  of 
these  men  who  proclaimed  the  Kingdom  of 
Heaven,  the  representatives  of  the  kingdom  of 
this  world  hurled  themselves  in  mortal  hostility. 
But  the  Galilean  fishermen  triumphed.  The 
Jewish  temple,  whose  priests  persecuted  and 
scattered  them,  has  become  a  ruin.  Jerusalem 
is  a  third-rate  town,  the  spoil  of  the  Turkish 
plunderers;  the  palace  of  the  Caesars  is  an  ivy- 
covered   pile    of    bricks   on    a   Roman  hill.      The 


ASPECTS    OF   CHRISTIAN1T2'.  57 

Empire  of  Tiberius  and  Augustus  is  a  dream  of 
the  past ;  its  military  roads  are  engineering  curi- 
osities, its  fortresses,  which  reached  from  Scot- 
land to  India,  are  heaps  of  moss-covered  stone. 
The  schools,  where  the  Greek  philosophers 
taught,  are  now  deserted,  and  beneath  the  plane 
trees,  where  the  pupils  of  Plato  listened  to  his 
golden  speech,  the  women  of  Athens  are  wash- 
ing their  garments  in  the  shrunken  stream  of  the 
Ilissus,  But  the  Kingdom  of  God  is  covering 
the  earth;  the  nations  that  accept  the  Christ 
with  His  teaching  of  Divine  Fatherhood  and 
human  brotherhood,  hold  in  their  hands  the 
moral  and  military  power,  the  learning,  the  arts, 
the  commerce  of  the  globe. 

A  few  years  ago,  an  English  scholar  wrote, 
"Christendom  to-day  is  a  greater  fact  than  ever 
before.  You  may  see  our  Queen,  head  of  an 
Empire  on  which  the  sun  never  sets,  kneel  in 
lowly  obeisance  at  the  shrine  of  the  crucified 
Nazarene;  or  glance  within  the  village  church, 
and  see  the  statesman  who  directs  the  destinies 
of  our  world-embracing  dominion,  humbly  bend 
his  head  as  he  prays  in  the  name  of  Jesus.  See 
the  young  German  Kaiser,  as  he  acts  as  chap- 
lain to  his  crew,  and  avows  his  loyalty  to  the 
Evangelical  religion,  which  is  the  creation  of  the 
Christ;  or,  amid  the  gorgeous  Oriental  display 
of  Moscow,  see  the  Czar  of  all  the  Russias  re- 
ceive his  crown  from  a  vassal  of  the  Son  of  Man. 
Or,  in    the    forms   of  worship    more    simple    and 


58    CHRISTIANITY,   THE    WORLD-RELIGION. 

severe,  see  President  after  President  of  the  vast 
Western  Republic  avow  his  fealty  to  our  Lord. 
The  rulers  of  America,  of  the  British,  German 
and  Russian  empires,  proclaim  themselves  Vice- 
roys of  the  Christ.  Do  their  territories  not  con- 
stitute a  realm  beside  which  the  grandest  em- 
pires of  antiquity  sink  into  insignificance?" 

If  we  glance  at  the  faiths  of  the  world  to-day, 
we  discover  that  Christianity  alone  presents  the 
aspect  of  a  world-wide  religion.  Look  at  Ju- 
daism, the  historical  root  of  Christianity;  failing 
to  receive  the  Christ,  it  shrank  into  a  national 
cult,  and  numbers,  to-day,  less  than  ten  millions 
of  our  race.  Judaism  doubtless  teaches  the 
great  principles  of  a  universal  faith,  which  Chris- 
tianity, summing  them  up  in  the  historic  and 
ever-living  Christ,  has  the  force  to  make  univer- 
sal. Christianity  was  a  proclamation  of  the 
noblest  truths  about  God  which  Israel  had  re- 
ceived or  attained.  But  Judaism  has  been  the 
John  the  Baptist,  diminishing,  while  Christianity, 
its  great  offspring,  has  increased.  In  some  meas- 
ure, it  has  yielded  to  the  pressure  of  Christian 
forces;  in  Western  lands  it  is  adopting  Christian 
ideals  and  adapting  itself  to  the  various  types  of 
Christian  civilization.  Only  less  ancient  than 
Judaism  is  the  religion  of  the  noble  Parsees,  the 
heirs  of  the  venerable  faith  of  Persia.  But  they 
have  not  become  more  numerous  with  time,  and 
from  Malabar  Hill,  I  say  it  in  no  critical  spirit, 
they  send  out  no  missionaries  to  convert  a  world. 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  59 

Confucianism,  which  is  older  than  historic  Chris- 
tianity, has  never  reached  after  world-wide  su- 
premacy; it  is  simply  Mongolian  social  ethics, 
and  its  strongest  ambition  has  apparently  been 
to  keep  within  the  national  boundaries.  It  has 
influenced  with  its  philosophy  the  military  literati 
of  Japan,  but  has  gone  little  further.  And,  in- 
stead of  furnishing  the  aspects  of  a  world-wide 
system  of  belief,  it  presents  to-day  the  sorry 
spectacle  of  the  most  populous  of  empires  cor- 
rupted, humiliated,  broken,  and  barely  escaping 
the  shame  of  seeing  the  horses  of  the  Mikado 
stabled  in  the  pagodas  of  Peking.'" 

Hinduism  appears  to  be  one  of  the  most  seclu- 
sive  of  all  the  faiths.  Its  followers  are  forbidden 
to  cross  the  "black  water,"  and  while  teaching 
a  comprehensive  philosophy,  it  is  pre-eminently 
an  ethnic  religion.  It  does  not  feel  itself  con- 
strained to  traverse  oceans  and  deserts  to  tell 
the  life-giving  truth  to  other  hearts. 

The  voyager  around  th'e  world  finds  only  one 
faith  in  all  lands,  and  supreme  in  the  most  civil- 
ized and  progressive  nations.  He  meets,  as  we 
have  seen,  only  two  other  religions  missionary  in 
character,  and  seeking  to  become  universal." 
One  of  these  is  Buddhism,  an  ethical  philosophy, 
humane  but  pessimistic,  rather  than  a  religion, 
which  appears  now  to  flourish  chiefly  among  peo- 
ples who  are  out  of  the  line  of   the  world's  main 

■"Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  10. 
"Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  11. 


6o     CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

development.  It  exists  in  Japan,  divided  into 
rival  sects.  It  exists  in  China,  a  part  of  the 
amalgam  of  Chinese  faiths.  It  is  found  in 
secluded  and  monastic  Thibet,  in  semi-barbarous 
Corea,  still  barbarous,  though  Buddha's  "Good 
Law  ' '  was  established  there  in  the  fourth  cen- 
tury; in  Burmah,  in  Ceylon,  in  Siam,  whose 
monarch  is  the  only  purely  Buddhistic  king  now 
reigning,  and  in  Cambodia  over  which  floats  the 
tri-colored  flag  of  the  French  Republic.  It  has 
been  driven  out  of  its  native  home,  and  in  the 
countries  where  it  now  prevails,  according  to 
Buddhistic  report,  "it  is  in  a  comatose  state,  and 
its  monks,  with  few  exceptions,  have  failed  to 
influence  the  people,  and  are  sadly  wanting  in 
the  desire  to  spread  abroad  the  teachings  of  their 
great  Master.'""  The  Buddhist  philosophy  is 
doubtless  accordant  with  some  .strong  tendencies 
now  prevailing  in  Western  thought,  but  Dr. 
Fairbairn  is  right  in  saying  that  "you  cannot 
naturalize  Buddhism  in  Europe;  it  would  die  of 
the  process,  broken  by  its  very  contact  with  the 
climate,  the  freedom,  the  institutions,  the  ener- 
gies, the  wholesome  nature  of  the  brawny  and 
healthful  West."  "Islam  also  is  an  Oriental 
faith ;  it  cannot  breathe  our  Western  air,  or  suit 
our  Western  mind." 

Some  authorities  claim  that  there  are  less  than 
one  hundred  millions  of  genuine  Buddhists,  for 
they  eliminate  from    the    enormous  iigures  which 

1- Appendix,  Lecture  I,  Note  12. 


ASPECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  6i 

are  usually  proclaimed,  the  four  hundred  mil- 
lions of  Chinese  who  are  to  be  reckoned  as 
Taoists  and  Confucianists.  Mr.  Gladstone  has 
given  the  weight  of  his  judgment  to  the  claim 
that  one-third  of  the  present  population  of  the 
globe  are  professing  Christians,  and  he  says  that 
at  every  point  of  the  circuit  the  question  is  not 
one  of  losing  ground  but  of  gaining  it.  "Chris- 
tianity is  the  religion  in  the  command  of  whose 
professors  is  lodged  a  proportion  of  power  far 
exceeding  its  superiority  of  numbers,  and  this 
power  is  both  moral  and  material.  The  art, 
literature,  the  systematized  industry,  invention, 
and  commerce — in  one  word  the  power  of  the 
world,  are  almost  wholly  Christian."  Whether 
the  power  which  belongs  to  Christendom,  as 
represented  by  the  Anglo-Saxon,  French,  Teu- 
tonic, Russian,  and  other  peoples  is  chiefly  due 
to  Christianity,  may  be  a  question  with  some, 
but  not  with  those  who  see  that  moral  forces  are 
supreme;  that  the  power  of  the  world,  material, 
intellectual  and  moral,  does  belong  to  Christen- 
dom, cannot  be  questioned  by  any. 

In  the  partition  of  Africa,  out  of  a  total  area 
of  eleven  and  a  half  million  square  miles,  only 
one  million  and  a  half  have  been  left  unap- 
propriated, and  this  gigantic  division  leaves  no 
important  non-Christian  state  in  the  Dark  Con- 
tinent. Mohammedanism  as  it  exists  in  Con- 
stantinople and  in  Africa,  is  not  in  full  sympa- 
thy with  our  humanitarian   century.      With  only 


62    CFIRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

one  powerful  Moslem  monarch  left  in  the  world, 
and  that  ruler  permitted  to  remain  in  Europe 
only  through  the  jealousies  of  Russia  and  Eng- 
land, Islam  is  not  in  the  least  likely  to  conquer 
all  mankind.  While  it  has  undoubtedly  splen- 
did and  noble  representatives,  especially  in 
India,  and  while  it  is  pushing  its  missionary  con- 
quests among  the  barbarous  tribes  of  Africa  with 
marvelous  success,  it  is  often  linked  with  forms 
of  despotic  government,  which  modern  civiliza- 
tion is  sweeping  away.  These  two  non-Christian 
missionary  faiths,  that  of  Buddha  and  that  of 
Mohammed,  are  being  penetrated,  and  in  some 
respects  modified,  by  the  Christian  Gospel,  while 
all  their  attempts  to  carry  on  missionary  work 
among  Western  Christian  peoples  have  not 
reached  historic  importance.  The  nominal  dis- 
ciples of  Christ  in  the  world  to-day  are  more  than 
four  hundred  millions,  while,  under  Christian 
governments,  dwelling  beneath  a  reign  of  law, 
and  the  influence  of  the  Gospel,  are  more  than 
six  hundred  millions  of  the  world's  inhabitants. 
Christianity  seems  to  hold  the  field  to-day.  It 
has  been  truly  said  that  "the  non-Christian 
nations  could  not  exclude  Christianity  if  they 
would,  and  the  most  enlightened  of  them  would 
not  if  they  could." 

Thus,  more  and  more,  it  presents  the  appear- 
ance of  a  world-wide  religion.  A  wise  man  must 
look  at  the.  trend  of  events,  must  watch  the  Gulf 
Stream   of    history,    and   note    that    to-day   it    is 


ASPECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITT.  63 

Christianity  only  which  is  cosmopolitan  and  in- 
creasingly prevalent  in  all  lands.  On  every 
shore,  Australasian,  Chinese  and  Siberian,  Japan- 
ese, Javanese  and  Indian,  Singhalese,  Persian 
and  Arabian,  Malagasy,  Zanzibar  and  Egyptian, 
Barbary,  Syrian  and  Turkish,  Grecian,  Italian 
and  Spanish,  Portuguese,  French  and  English, 
German,  Dutch  and  Scandinavian,  Russian,  Ice- 
landic and  Hawaiian,  Brazilian,  Mexican  and 
American,  from  the  North  Cape  of  Europe  to 
where  the  sailor  beholds  "the  long  wave  rolling 
from  the  Southern  Pole  to  break  upon  Japan," 
are  the  manifold  evidences  that  Christianity  is  a 
vital  and  progressive  force.  A  large  work  of 
preparation  has  already  been  accomplished.  The 
world  is  being  made  ready  through  governments, 
through  steamships  and  railroads,  through  inter- 
national communication,  through  a  better  and  a 
friendlier  feeling  toward  Christians,  through  a 
new  knowledge,  which  discriminates  between 
true  and  false  Christianity,  through  a  better  un- 
derstanding of  the  loving  spirit  of  the  true,  is 
being  made  ready,  I  say,  for  a  universal  faith. 
All  nations  and  religions  find  in  the  Christian 
system  a  common  meeting  ground,  and  some  of 
the  ethnic  and  some  of  the  so-called  universal 
faiths  are  acknowledging  and  adopting  certain  of 
the  distinctive  truths  of  the  Christian  Gospel. 
There  has  been  no  century  so  memorable  as  the 
present  for  the  increase  of  knowledge,  for  the 
advance  of  every  department  of  science,  and  for 


64     CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  diffusion  of  popular  intelligence.  It  is  vastly 
significant,  therefore,  and  in  accordance  with  the 
genius  of  Christianity,  that  the  religion  of  Christ 
has  in  this  century  of  intellectual  progress,  when 
superstitions  have  been  dispelled  by  the  light  of 
truth,  made  more  rapid  and  memorable  con- 
quests than  in  any  previous  period  since  the 
downfall  of  Roman  paganism. 

But  all  the  progress,  which  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury has  achieved,  appears  to  many  Christians 
but  a  faint  prophecy  of  the  Christian  victories 
that  await  the  twentieth.  On  the  23rd  of  June, 
1 86 1,  Sir  Samuel  Baker  and  his  party  were  sleep- 
ing in  the  dry  bed  of  the  Atbara,  one  of  the 
tributaries  of  the  Nile.  In  this  dry  river-bed 
they  had  been  traveling  for  days.  On  this  night 
Sir  Samuel  Baker  was  awakened  by  a  noise  like 
distant  thunder.  Soon  his  native  attendants 
rushed  in  upon  him  shouting  in  their  terror  "The 
River!"  and  with  all  speed,  they  hastened  to 
the  parched  and  sandy  shore,  and  soon  the  tor- 
rent, which  had  gathered  its  volume  of  waters 
among  the  snows  of  the  mountains  of  Abyssinia, 
rushed  by,  and  on  the  morning  of  the  24th  of 
June,  when  the  sun  arose,  the  English  traveler 
looked  out  over  a  river  fifteen  hundred  feet 
broad  and  from  fifteen  to  twenty  feet  in  depth, 
rolling  on  in  freshness  and  fertilizing  power, 
moistening  the  roots  of  ten  thousand  palm  trees, 
at  last  to  be  spread  over  the  immemorial  fields 
of  Egypt.     So  the  waters  of  Christian  civilization 


ASPECTS   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  65 

have  been  long  accumulating  on  the  highlands 
of  Europe  and  America,  and  a  mighty  rushing 
river  has  suddenly  descended  on  the  thirsty 
African  plains  and  over  the  tropic  fields  of  India, 
and  the  freshly  opened  provinces  of  the  Celes- 
tial Empire;  and  the  roar  of  the  oncoming  tor- 
rent appears  to  some  of  us  a  new  fulfilment  of 
Ezekiel's  vision  of  a  sacred  stream,  which  shall 
go  out  into  the  east  country  and  down  into  the 
desert,  healing  the  waters  of  the  bitter  sea. 


THE    WORLD-WIDE    EFFECTS    OF 
CHRISTIANITY. 


The  science  of  Comparative  Religion  is  the  direct  off- 
spring of  the  religion  of  Jesus.  It  is  distinctively  Christian 
Science. — The  Religions  of  Japan,  Griffis,  p.  4. 

The  secret  of  Jesus  was  the  unswerving,  uncompromis- 
ing, practical,  idealism  with  which  He  faced  the  evils  of  life 
and  the  darkness  of  death,  and  refused  to  regard  them  as 
other  than  weapons  in  the  hand  of  an  omnipotent  goodness 
which,  in  spite  of  them,  and  through  them,  is  irresistibly 
realizing  its  divine  purpose. — The  Evolution  of  Religion, 
Vol.  II,  p.  88,  Edward  Caird. 

The  fairer  comparison  of  civilizations  and  revelations  is 
not  gained  by  looking  down  from  the  words  of  Christ  to 
their  fruits  in  the  government  of  the  western  world,  but 
by  looking  up  from  the  fruits  of  the  East  to  the  fruits  of  the 
West,  and  from  the  words  of  Confucius  to  the  words  of 
Christ.  Until  that  far-off  day  when  words  and  deeds  are 
synonyms  this  is  the  first  principle  of  comparison.  Each 
must  be  compared  with  its  own  kind. — The  Shadow  Christ, 
Gerald  Stanley  Lee,  p.  4. 

The  impression  left  upon  us  is  one  of  perpetual  hope. 
We  find  Jesus  eating  and  drinking,  and  taking  part  in  the 
festivities  of  earth,  and  no  time  warning  us  that  desire  is 
evil  ;  on  the  contrary,  rather  encouraging  us  to  be  as  full 
as  possible  of  desire,  to  live  the  largest  possible  life;  not 
bidding  us  reduce  life  to  its  lowest  terms,  and  blot  out 
impulse,  but  rather  to  seek  to  be  filled  with  His  own  trium- 
phant fullness.— Prof.  George  H.  Palmer. 


SECOND   LECTURE. 

THE   WORLD-WIDE    EFFECTS    OF    CHRISTIANITY. 

In  the  first  Lecture,  I  invited  your  attention  to 
the  universal  aspects  of  Christianity.  Although 
at  one  period  the  Roman  paganism,  and  at  a 
later  Mohammedanism,  occupied  more  of  the 
earth's  habitable  surface  than  Christendom,  and 
although  it  is  easy  to  overestimate  the  argument 
for  the  truth  and  fitness  of  any  belief  from  its 
wide  acceptance,  still  the  great  religions  have 
been  acting  upon  each  other  and  upon  the  world 
through  such  a  vast  stretch  of  time,  that  it  is 
not  without  significance  that  the  nations  that 
have  accepted  the  Christian  faith  hold  in  their 
hands  the  civilization  and  the  practical  sove- 
reignty of  the  globe. 

Professor  Kuenen  has  said  that  "if  there  is  no 
universal  language,  there  certainly  are  universal 
religions."  It  appears  to  me  more  accurate  to 
speak  of  these  faiths,  as  Kuenen  sometimes  does, 
as  "international"  religions,  since,  looked  at 
geographically,  only  one  of  them  appears  at 
present  to  deserve  the  name  "universal."  A 
few  years  ago,  in  Boston,  were  gathered  a  com- 
pany of   Christian   converts   from   many  nations, 

69 


70     CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  from  all  the  great  continents,  and,  in  nearly 
a  score  of  languages,  they  sang  together,  in  the 
spirit  of  those  early  Bithynian  disciples  whom 
Pliny  mentions,  a  hymn  in  praise  of  the  Christ. 
Probably  no  such  testimony  to  the  wide  diffusion 
and  spiritual  unity  of  any  other  faith  than  the 
Christian  could  have  been  offered  in  any  period 
of  its  history. 

Christianity  has  already  been  accepted  by 
so  many  races  of  men,  and  has  prevailed  over  so 
many  other  religions,  at  least  in  individual  cases, 
that  it  hardly  seems  safe  to  argue  with  Herbert 
Spencer  that  every  religion  is  the  best  which  its 
followers  could  hold  and  practice  in  that  stage  of 
their  development.  And  it  seems  like  playing 
with  history  for  another  to  write:  "No  nation 
can  part  with  its  religion  without  destroying  its 
mental  continuity  and  cutting  itself  off  in  a  fatal 
way  from  the  sources  of  its  strength."  Without 
denying  the  providential  character  of  other  faiths, 
we  cannot  be  certain  that  they  are  the  best  which 
their  peoples  can  at  present  possess.  The  na- 
tions among  whom  Christianity  now  prevails  had 
other  religions  which  they  left  with  moral  ad- 
vantage. It  may  be  true  that  Mohammedanism 
"accomplished  more  for  Arabia  in  a  few  years 
than  Christianity  had  accomplished  in  centuries." 
But,  what  sort  of  Christianity  was  it,  and  how 
generally  was  it  received?  A  faith  like  Islam 
may  make  swifter  progress  among  certain  peoples 
than  Christianity,  and   it   must  be  said  regarding 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIAN  ITT.  7 1 

Mohammedanism  that,  while  it  secured  sudden 
progress,  it  was  only  up  to  a  certain  limit,  when 
it  ceased  to  advance.  After  men  have  attained 
in  large  measure  the  ideal  of  a  religion,  unless 
that  ideal  is  a  continually  expanding  one,  their 
future  improvement  is  barred.  The  Arabian 
Moslems  certainly  found  in  Islam  something  that 
was  good,  and,  as  is  often  the  case,  the  good 
proved  the  enemy  of  the  best.'  Every  fair- 
minded  student  must  acknowledge  that  the  his- 
tory of  all  religions  has  been  a  record  of  good  and 
evil  strangely  blended.  But  whatever  may 
be  justly  said  of  the  evil  effects  which  have 
accompanied  religion,  it  is  undoubtedly  true 
that  all  the  civilizations  have  had  some  kind 
of  a  religion  as  their  basis.  The  Sacred  Books 
of  the  Hindus  preceded  all  East  Indian  cul- 
ture, and  the  oldest  monuments  of  Egypt 
were  built  on  the  faith  that  man  does  not 
spring  from  the  dust.  The  literature  of  ancient 
Greece  rose  out  of  the  heart  of  the  Greek  the- 
ology. The  poetry  of  Homer,  whose  blind  eyes 
were  ever  turned  toward  Olympus,  was  the 
groundwork  of  Hellenic  culture  and  the  cradle  of 
Hellenic  civilization.  Back  of  the  glory  of  Moor- 
ish art  and  letters  were  the  glow  and  energy  of 
religious  enthusiasm.  The  better  conditions  of 
society  which  we  now  enjoy  in  Christendom,  and 
the  majestic  energies  of  science  put  forth  in  the 
discovery  and  application  of  truth,  have  had  no 
'  Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  i. 


72     CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

shallow  origin.  They  have  not  risen  from  the 
impulse  which  says,  "Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for 
to-morrow  we  die."  It  is  rather  the  spirit  which 
has  linked  man  to  supernal  realms  which  has 
stimulated  to  earnest  search  and  benevolent 
activity. 

Dean  Farrar,  in  a  panegyric  which  it  seems  to 
me  no  intelligent   man  would   think   of  applying 
to  any  other   faith,  calls   civilization   the   secular 
name    for   Christianity,  and  scientific  students  of 
social  progress,  like   Benjamin   Kidd,  have  found 
the   main-spring  of    human  advancement  in  the 
altruistic    forces   of   religion.      How  futile    is  the 
attempt  to  separate  from  the  renovating  efficacy 
of   the   Christian   faith    the   marvelous  advances 
which   have   been   made   since  the  savage  forefa- 
thers  of   the  Anglo-Saxon   peoples   roamed   the 
dank  forests  along  the   Baltic  Sea!      Englishmen 
and  Americans  are  the  descendants  of  savages  to 
whom  the    Christian    Gospel  was  carried  by  men 
possessed  with  the   spirit   of   Henry   Martyn  and 
Adoniram     Judson.       My     father's    grandfather 
lived  in  the  colonial  period  of  American  history. 
His  grandfather  was  a  subject  of  Queen   Eliza- 
beth.     His  father   at   the  twelfth  remove,  was  a 
Norman    invader   or   a   Saxon   patriot  when  the 
battle   of    Hastings   was    fought    in    1066.      His 
father  of  the  twelfth  remove  was  either  a  piratical 
Norseman,  the  terror  of   land    and   sea,  or  a  sub- 
ject   of    that    Saxon    King    Ethelbert,   to  whose 
island  the  Abbot  Augustine  and   forty  other  mis- 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITT.  73 

sionaries  were  sent  by  Gregory  the  Great  in  the 
sixth  century.  Canterbury  became  the  cradle  of 
British  Christianity, a  center  of  hghtjSuch  as  Beirut 
is  to-day  to  the  Arabic-speaking  world.  Long 
and  weary  and  uncertain  was  the  battle  of  Christ 
with  Woden,  the  word  of  God  with  Saxon  heath- 
enism. That  heathenism,  Mr.  Spencer  to  the  con- 
trary, was  not  the  best  of  which  the  Saxon  people 
were  then  capable,  aided  by  the  Divine  Spirit, 
working  with  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Christ.  Chris- 
tian hearts  in  Rome  brooded  over  the  pagan  bar- 
barism of  England,  and  prayed  and  toiled  for  the 
conversion  of  my  Saxon  forefathers,  just  as 
Christian  hearts  in  London,  in  our  lifetime,  have 
brooded  over  the  pagan  barbarism  of  Madagas- 
car. Speaking  generally,  we  may  say  that  what 
in  large  measure  makes  the  peoples  of  Saxon 
origin  to  differ  from  their  fierce  and  bloody  an- 
cestors who  fought  in  the  forests  of  England  and 
Germany,  is  the  Christian  labors  of  men  who 
believed,  with  a  certain  Roman  citizen  born  in 
Tarsus  and  converted  at  Damascus,  that  they 
were  debtors  to  preach  Christ  to  the  barbarians. 
In  this  Lecture  I  shall  try  to  indicate  some  of 
the  world-wide  effects  of  Christianity  which  tend 
to  support  the  thesis  that  this  faith  is  the  world- 
religion,  peerless,  supreme,  final.  Among  other 
tests  which  must  be  applied  to  religions  is  their 
success  or  failure  in  bringing  men  into  harmony 
with  God  and  into  high  and  noble  relations  with 
each  other.      But    I   am   not   at   this  time  to  con- 


74    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

demn  a  system  simply  because  it  is  not  the  most 
perfect  in  its  revelation  of  the  Divine  Person- 
ality, for  I  recognize  the  working  of  the  law  of 
evolution,  and  remember,  from  the  connection 
of  Christianity  with  Judaism  that  "men  on  a 
large  scale  are  not  always  ripe  for  the  highest 
religion ;  that  there  is  a  fullness  of  time  which  it 
may  take  four  thousand  years  to  produce."  I 
would,  however,  limit  this  to  nations,  making 
exceptions  of  individuals.  Furthermore,  I  con- 
tend that  Christianity  must  not  be  judged  from 
its  effects  upon  those  who  have  not  received  it, 
or  who  have  received  it  in  some  inferior  form. 
We  may  even  grant,  with  Cardinal  Newman,  the 
difftculty  of  showing,  "that  Christianity  has  at 
any  time  been  of  any  great  spiritual  advantage 
to  the  world  at  large."  Certainly,  if  the  world 
at  large  refuses  to  receive  the  Christ,  and  to  con- 
form to  His  law,  we  may  not  look  for  spiritual 
advantages  of  any  decisive  character.  Still  there 
may  be,  and  there  may  be  shown  to  be,  moral 
and  social  effects  of  immense  value,  inseparable 
from  the  diffusion  of  Christianity  even  among 
the  rejectors  of  its  claims,  just  as  medical  mis- 
sionaries have  brought  many  of  the  priceless 
benefits  of  Western  science  to  thousands  "cursed 
with  the  superstitions,  witchcrafts  and  unuttera- 
ble terrors  linked  with  the  practice  of  medicine  in 
Africa  and  China. 

But  still  other  cautions  are  required.      One  is 
this,    that    no    religion,    whether    Hinduism     or 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  75 

Buddhism,  Mohammedanism  or  Fetichism,  is  to 
be  judged  solely  by  its  errors  and  defects.  Is  it 
not  easily  possible  to  draw  such  a  picture  of 
Christendom  from  the  revelations  made  by  Gen- 
eral William  Booth  of  Darkest  London,  and  Dr. 
Parkhurst  of  Darkest  New  York,  and  Mr.  Wil- 
liam T.  Stead  of  Darkest  Chicago,  supplemented 
by  the  horrible  stains  of  crime  and  unspeakable 
vice  which  defile  our  recent  journalism,  that  non- 
Christian  nations  should  sincerely  regard  Chris- 
tianity as  a  deplorable  failure?  The  opponents 
of  our  faith  in  Christian  lands  have  often  out- 
raged our  sense  of  justice  by  parading  the  long 
list  of  wars  and  crimes  and  persecutions  and 
inquisitions  and  superstitions  and  bigotries  which 
have  marked  the  annals  of  Christendom.  It 
need  not  be  said  to  you  that  all  these  iniquities 
are  transgressions  of  the  fundamental  law  of 
Christianity,  the  law  of  love  to  God  and  man. 
We  believe  that  Christ  Himself  in  His  life,  spirit 
and  teaching  is  the  substance  of  our  faith;  He 
brings  to  us  the  doctrine  of  God's  Fatherhood 
and  makes  it  real;  He  brings  to  us  the  doctrine 
of  God's  spirituality,  and  delivers  us  from  formal- 
ism; He  brings  to  us  the  doctrine  of  God's  right- 
eousness, and  forbids  our  cherishing  evil.  He 
teaches  in  His  own  life  the  supremacy  of  love, 
and  He  illustrates  the  spirit  of  self-sacrifice.  He 
sets  forth  the  dignity  and  divine  worth  of  man — 
of  man  not  as  one  of  the  sexes,  but  as  including 
both.      He    gives    a    new  honor    to  womanhood 


76    CHRISTIANITY,  THE    WORLD-RELIGIOX. 

and  to  childhood.  His  instruction  is  meant  to 
regenerate  the  household,  and  to  remold  society. 
He  sets  forth  the  vital  importance  of  fidelity,  in- 
ward purity,  and  mutual  kindness.  He  illus- 
trates in  His  life  the  law  of  forgiveness,  and  by 
His  death  He  makes  redemption  an  actual  thing, 
an  accomplished  fact,  for  all  who  will  receive  it, 
and  by  His  resurrection  He  brings  the  life  im- 
mortal into  new  and  abiding  radiance.  There- 
fore, whatever,  in  any  degree,  is  contrary  to  the 
reigning  spirit  and  the  foundation  principles  of 
Jesus  Christ,  is  a  failure  to  illustrate  the  legiti- 
mate effects  of  Christianity. 

It  must  never  be  forgotten  that  the  stream  of 
divine  life  has  been  flowing  through  the  cor- 
rupted hearts  of  men.  As  the  River  Jordan, 
that  gushes  from  the  rocky  cavern  at  the  base  of 
Mount  Hermon,  is  of  crystalline  clearness, 
sparkling  with  the  joy  of  new-born  sunlight  in 
the  east,  but  when  its  winding  course  is  finished, 
has  become  a  muddy  stream  covered  at  times 
with  driftwood  rushing  into  the  Dead  Sea;  so 
Christianity  entered  a  corrupt  and  decrepit 
world,  a  stream  of  living  water  casting  up  a  lux- 
uriant vegetation  along  its  banks.  But  soon, 
and  for  many  years,  it  was  compelled,  as  it  were, 
to  run  underground.  While  the  Caesars  ruled  in 
palace  and  Colosseum,  the  Church  of  God,  the 
true  life  of  old  Rome,  was  singing  its  hymns, 
and  burying  its  dead  beneath  inscriptions  of  im- 
mortal hope  in  the  labyrinthine  catacombs  under 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  77 

the  Seven  Hills.  But,  at  last,  in  God's  own 
time,  the  Church  rose  to  the  surface,  the  under- 
ground flood  was  pressed  up  through  the  polluted 
soil  of  the  city  of  abominations.  Do  you  won- 
der that  it  w^as  stained?  And  so  it  has  been  in 
some  measure  ever  since.  Christendom  has  not 
been  the  Christianity  which  lay  in  the  mind  of 
its  Founder.  Suppose  a  great  musician  leaves 
an  oratorio  as  the  transcript  of  his  best  genius 
and  noblest  thought,  and  a  thousand  singers  are 
gathered  together  to  render  it,  and  some  of 
them  are  ignorant,  and  others  are  careless,  and 
others  of  them  intentionally  sing  false  notes,  and 
only  one-half  of  the  performers  are  in  thorough 
sympathy  with  the  master's  mind — what  would 
result?  Doubtless  a  skilled  ear  could  detect 
noble  harmonies  in  the  midst  of  wretched  dis- 
cords, but  every  just  man  would  say,  "This  is 
not  the  oratorio  as  it  lay  in  the  mind  of  Handel 
or  Mendelssohn.  Give  me  faithful  and  sympa- 
thetic hearts,  and  I  will  pour  forth  a  multitudinous 
chorus,  sweet  and  sublime  as  the  angels'  song  in 
Bethlehem."  If  the  critics  of  the  Christian  re- 
ligion would  study  the  genius  of  the  Gospel, 
and  its  ethical  principles,  they  might  gain  juster 
conceptions.  A  chemist  who  explores  only  a 
poisoned  atmosphere  is  not  likely  to  understand 
the  properties  of  air.  Suppose  some  brilliant 
babbler  in  science  should  have  the  following  ex- 
perience: he  sits  by  his  evening  lamp, — a  gust 
of  wind  blows   it   out ;  he  walks  the  street, — the 


78    CHRISTIANITV,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

cold  air  chills  him ;  he  ascends  a  mountain, — the 
thin  air  makes  him  gasp  for  breath ;  he  crosses 
the  ocean, — a  hurricane  imperils  the  ship;  he 
descends  into  an  English  coal-pit, — the  choke- 
damp  endangers  his  life;  he  crosses  the  Cam- 
pagna  of  Rome, — a  deadly  wind  withers  his 
strength;  he  looks  down  into  Vesuvius, — a  sul- 
phurous gust  half  chokes  him.  Whereupon  he 
returns  to  his  home,  and  having  thought  over 
all  his  painful  experiences  with  the  atmosphere, 
he  takes  the  platform,  and  announces  his  con- 
viction that  air  is  the  great  curse  of  the  world ! 
Fools  listen,  and  applaud,  forgetting  that  in  this 
vast  ethereal  ocean,  from  the  beginning  of 
recorded  time  man  has  moved  and  had  his  being, 
and  that  without  it  "all  life  dies,  death  lives,  and 
nature  breeds  perverse."  Religion  is  the  atmo- 
sphere in  which  humanity  lives,  and  rather  than 
dispense  with  it,  we  can  well  endure  the  thin  air 
of  ritualism,  the  cold  fogs  of  bigotry,  and  even 
the  noxious  vapors  of  cruel  superstition. 

I  put  forward  this  plea  and  present  these 
facts  not  in  behalf  of  Christianity  only,  but  also 
of  that  larger  world  of  religion  which  still  lies 
outside  of  it.  Dr.  Martin,  President  of  the  Im- 
perial University  in  Peking,  has  recently  written: 
"In  the  most  frigid  zones  of  the  non-Christian 
world  there  are  warm  currents  that  rise  toward 
the  sun,  and  in  the  warmer  spiritual  atmosphere 
of  Christendom  are  there  not  cold  currents  that 
set  away  from  Him?"     And  he  adds  that  "It  is 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIAXITT.  79 

a  mistake  to  imagine  that  the  Holy  Ghost  con- 
fines His  operations  within  the  forms  of  Chris- 
tianity. In  non-Christian  countries  His  presence 
is  like  electric  fluid  in  the  atmosphere,  while  in 
Christendom  it  is  like  that  fluid  circulating 
through  a  network  of  wires,  and  responding  to 
the  human  touch,  in  producing  light,  heat  and 
power." 

Many  of  the  best  religions  of  the  world  have 
been  treated  like  criminals,  they  have  been  esti- 
mated by  their  worst  faults,  and  those  who  do 
this  have  justly  been  compared  to  men  "who 
judge  of  the  health  of  a  people  from  its  hospitals, 
or  its  morality  from  its  prisons."  The  fact  that 
the  ethical  codes  of  nearly  all  the  great  faiths 
resemble  each  other  in  many  things  is  known  to 
students,  and,  as  Dr.  Washburn  of  Constantinople 
has  said,  ' '  so  far  from  being  discouraging  to  Chris- 
tians, it  is  one  of  the  principal  grounds  of  our 
faith  in  God's  purpose  to  redeem  the  whole 
world." 

But  while  religions  are  not  to  be  judged  solely 
by  their  worst  results  or  accompaniments,  on  the 
other  hand  they  must  not  be  estimated  merely 
by  the  brighter  and  more  beneficent  effects 
which  the  zealous  advocate  is  able  to  discover 
and  point  out.  The  Editor  of  The  Hindu  of 
Madras  wrote  recently  that  if  Christianity  is  to 
be  judged  only  by  the  ideal  of  Christ,  and  not 
by  Christendom,  "let  Hinduism  be  judged  also 
by  its  highest  ideals"  and,   he  would    doubtless 


8o     CHRISTIAN/TV,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

add,  by  its  highest  effects.  But  this  appears  to 
me  an  incomplete  test,  and  hence  a  partly  mis- 
leading one  for  any  religion.  By  omitting  all 
the  evil  and  emphasizing  all  that  is  more  gra- 
cious and  lofty  in  the  history  for  example  of 
Islam  and  of  Hinduism,  splendid,  but  after  all 
untruthful  pictures  may  be  drawn,  and  have 
been  drawn  of  these  faiths.^  It  is  necessary  in 
order  to  understand  a  religion,  to  discover  its 
fundamental  ideas  and  its  working  forces,  as  well 
as  the  results  associated  with  it.  We  must  dis- 
cover what  are  the  legitimate  fruits,  and  what  are 
the  incidents  or  the  accidents  of  the  historic 
development  of  a  faith.  Other  causes  co-operate 
with  religion,  and  their  force  must  be  estimated. 
We  are  not  afraid  to  have  Christianity  compared 
with  other  systems  by  any  series  of  tests  which 
will  help  us  to  bring  out  the  truth.''  These  tests 
must  include  the  fundamental  ethical  and  spir- 
itual ideas  of  each  faith,  its  incomplete  and 
ignoble  teachings,  if  there  be  such,  the  spiritual 
dynamics  of  each  through  which  its  ideals  be- 
come realized,  the  best  effects  which  each  faith 
can  show,  and  what  I  may  call  the  average 
results,  its  working  through  long  ages  on  great 
masses  of  people,  in  other  words  its  vital  rela- 
tion to  civilization,  enlightenment,  liberty  and 
progress. 

It  will  thus  be  seen    that    discriminating  judg- 

"  Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  2. 
^Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  3. 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  8 1 

ment  is  required  in  handling  so  complex  a  sub- 
ject as  the  world-wide  effects  of  Christianity- 
compared  with  those  of  other  faiths.  Not  one 
of  them  is  seen  in  the  moral  perfection  which  is 
its  ideal.  Of  the  religions  which  now  oppose 
Christian  progress  it  may  be  said  that  the  higher 
principles  discoverable  in  their  sacred  books  sur- 
pass their  attainments  and  their  present  popular 
standards.  At  the  same  time,  there  may  be 
certain  fundamental  errors  and  vices,  or  a  certain 
lack  of  spiritual  propulsion  in  the  ethnic  creed, 
sterilizing  the  beneficent  results,  and  crippling 
the  moral  progress  which  might  have  been  ex- 
pected from  the  ideal. 

The  divine  forces  of  Christianity  have  ever 
been  opposed  by  secular,  sensual,  and  it  may  be 
diabolic  powers  and  agencies,  and  sometimes  the 
lower  prevails  over  the  higher,  and  often  the  two 
are  mingled.  Noble  truths  and  vilest  corruptions 
appear  side  by  side.  Not  every  child  brought 
up  in  a  Christian  household  embodies  the  Chris- 
tian spirit,  and  much  that  has  called  itself  Chris- 
tian is  only  baptized  paganism  of  a  poor  quality. 
Look  for  example  at  the  Christianity  that  is 
found  in  Abyssinia.  It  is  lacking  in  life  and 
energy;  it  is  as  mechanical  as  an  ox-cart,  as  in- 
flexible as  a  granite  bowlder.  When  compared 
with  an  aggressive  Mohammedanism  it  seems  like 
a  mummy  by  the  side  of  an  enthusiastic  devotee. 
"There  may  be  four  million  Monophysite  Chris- 
tians in  Africa  "  it  has  been  said,  "but  so  far  as 


82    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

shaping  the  future  of  the  continent  is  concerned 
they  might  as  well  be  reckoned  sarcophagites." 
Christendom  still  is  far  behind  the  idea  of  Christ. 
"Never,"  says  Max  Muller,  "shall  I  forget  the 
deep  despondency  of  a  Hindu  convert,  a  real 
martyr  to  his  faith,  who  had  pictured  to  himself 
from  the  pages  of  the  New  Testament  what  a 
Christian  country  must  be,  and  who,  when  he 
came  to  Europe,  found  everything  so  different 
from  what  he  imagined  in  his  lonely  meditations 
at  Benares!  It  was  the  Bible  only  that  saved 
him  from  returning  to  his  old  religion  and 
helped  him  discern  beneath  theological  futilities, 
accumulated  during  nearly  two  thousand  years, 
beneath  Pharisaical  hypocrisy,  infidelity,  and 
want  of  charity,  the  buried  but  still  life-giving 
seed  committed  to  the  earth  by  Christ  and  His 
Apostles."* 

Christianity  in  its  worst  aspects  has  been  at 
times  inferior  to  other  religions.''  How  often 
have  we  beheld  the  Church  arrayed  in  cruel 
antagonism  against  the  Jew,  when  the  Christ 
within  us,  like  the  Christ  in  the  heavens,  has 
taken  part  with  the  persecuted  Israelite  against 
an  un-Christian  Christendom ! 

But  it  should  here  be  said  that  the  Founder  of 
our  faith  expected  what  has  occurred,  the  pres- 
ent condition  where  we  see  the  crop  of  tares  un- 
eradicated,    the    noxious   darnel   growing    beside 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  4. 
^  Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  5. 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  83 

the  wheat,  the  poisonous  weed  flourishing  rankly 
in  close  proximity  to  the  heavenly  grain.  All 
this  was  not  unforeseen  by  the  Lord  who  de- 
clared that  the  good  seed  and  the  evil  were  to 
grow  together  until  the  harvest.  While  Jesus 
prophesied  that  the  whole  mass  is  to  be  leavened 
with  the  Gospel,  that  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven 
is  to  compass  the  earth,  still  a  state  of  perfect 
being  is  not  seen  under  the  present  dispensation 
of  the  world. 

Furthermore,  where  the  aims  are  so  high,  and 
the  life  so  vigorous  and  profuse,  the  contrasts 
are  liable  to  be  most  vivid  and  startling.  Every 
opportunity  for  the  greatest  good  becomes  an 
occasion  also  for  the  rankest  evil.  Where  the 
lambs  bleat,  the  wolves  howl ;  where  the  herds 
feed,  the  lions  roar.  And  St.  Augustine,  who 
wrote  against  the  fiery  intolerance  which  pro- 
claimed that  the  tares  must  be  forcibly  uprooted, 
and  that  discipline  must  be  remorselessly  severe, 
and  that  intellectual  and  moral  heresies  must  not 
be  endured,  af^rmed  for  our  consolation  that 
while  the  Church  should  be  holy,  they  only  are 
its  true  members  who  are  in  living  fellowship 
with  Christ.  Others  may  press  upon  Him  as  did 
the  thronging  multitudes,  but  they  do  not  touch 
Him  as  did  the  believing  woman  on  whom  His 
virtue  streamed  forth. 

The  hypocrites  who  are  in  the  Church  do  not 
defile  the  true  members  so  long  as  these  are  not 
of   their   spirit  and  activities.     They  are  like  the 


84    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

unclean  animals  in  the  sanne  ark  with  the  clean, 
or  the  goats  in  the  same  pasture  with  the  sheep, 
or  chaff  in  the  same  barn  with  the  grain,  or  ves- 
sels of  dishonor  in  the  same  house  with  vessels  of 
honor;  they  are  to  be  endured  for  a  while,  for 
in  the  end  the  good  shall  be  separated  from  the 
evil  forever.  The  imperfections  and  sins  of 
Christian  nations  are  quite  as  evident  to  us  as  to 
others.  We  deplore  them,  and  fight  against 
them.  I  have  seen  a  great  Christian  audience 
loudly  applauding  a  Japanese  Buddhist  elo- 
quently declaiming  against  the  injustice  prac- 
ticed upon  his  people  by  so-called  Christian 
Governments, 

Not  forgetful  of  all  these  cautions  and  limita- 
tions let  us  now  inquire  if  the  actual  historic 
results  of  Christianity  have  not  been  such  as  to 
strengthen  faith  in  its  ultimate  universal  preva- 
lence. We  shall  expect,  from  our  knowledge  of 
the  destructive  forces  of  sin,  that  the  Gospel 
would  encounter  deadliest  opposition,  and  that, 
where  sin  could  not  destroy,  it  would  degrade  it. 
Therefore,  a  knowledge  of  the  corruptions  of 
Christianity  does  not  undermine  our  faith. 

Beginning  as  a  hated  superstition,  despised  by 
the  leaders  of  the  most  hated  and  despised  of 
ancient  races,  loathed  by  the  philosophic  Greek, 
and  offensive  to  the  haughty  and  martial  Roman, 
we  are  not  amazed  that  the  first  disciples  of 
Christianity,  entering  with  their  Gospel  of  love 
into   a    world   without    love,   were    ruthlessly  as- 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  85 

sailed,  and  that,  as  their  conquests  spread,  the 
persecution  became  more  destructive. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  its  Jewish  origin;  in  spite  of  its 
exclusiveness,  for  it  demanded  then,  as  it  de- 
mands now,  the  surrender  of  every  other  system 
as  a  means  of  salvation ;  in  spite  of  its  relentless 
antagonism  to  idolatry,  impurity,  injustice, — we 
find  the  religion  of  Jesus,  blessed  with  the  grate- 
ful eulogies  of  many  of  its  pagan  enemies,  rising 
victorious  out  of  the  gloomy  catacombs  and  the 
blood-stained  sands  of  the  amphitheater  to  final 
victory  over  the  greatest  embodiment  of  human 
power,  wickedness  and  enmity  which  the  Church 
ever  encountered,  the  Empire  of  Rome."  We 
find  it  at  last  victorious  in  school  and  temple,  in 
court  and  camp  and  home.  It  strengthens  faith 
in  the  divine  possibilities  of  man  to  read  the 
story  of  the  Christian  conflict  with  Roman 
paganism,  and  to  remember  that  neither  the  per- 
secutions under  Nero  and  Marcus  Aurelius  and 
Diocletian,  neither  the  hostile  legislation  of  Tro- 
jan, nor  all  that  slander  and  hate  could  achieve, 
was  able  to  withstand  the  majestic,  though 
agonizing,  progress  of  the  Church.  Armed  only 
with  spiritual  weapons,  and  baring  her  breast 
to  the  spear  of  the  destroyer,  she  witnessed  for 
Christ  her  King.  "Those  were  times  of  awful 
agony,"  writes  the  historian,  "the  two  years  of 
Decius,  the  ten  years  of  Diocletian,  when  the 
powerful   Roman    Empire,  shutting  the  gates  of 

^  Appendi.K,  Lecture  II,  Note  6. 


86     CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  amphitheater  leaped  into  the  arena  face  to 
face  with  the  Christian  Church.  When  those 
gates  were  opened,  the  victorious  Church  went 
forth  with  the  baptism  of  blood  on  her  saintly 
brow,  bearing  a  new  Christian  empire  in  her  fair 
white  arms." 

Nothing  more  loftily  inspiring  can  be  read 
than  the  story  of  the  Christian  victory  which 
issued  from  the  Church's  meager  beginning.  No 
wonder  Roman  historians  overlooked  that  be- 
cfinnincr;  no  wonder  that  Tacitus  and  Suetonius 
took  no  account  of  anything  so  insignificant  as  the 
origin  of  the  tiny  society  which  the  despised 
prophet  of  Galilee  gathered  about  Him.  Nothing 
formidable  to  Roman  supremacy  appeared  pos- 
sible in  the  earliest  stages  of  Christian  history. 
"At  first  sight,"  as  Renan  has  said,  "the  work 
of  Jesus  did  not  seem  likely  to  survive;  the  con- 
gregation seemed  to  have  nothing  before  it  but 
to  dissolve  into  anarchy."  But  the  seed  of  the 
world-wide  kingdom  of  God  was  securely  lodged 
in  a  few  lowly  but  exultant  hearts.  They  knew 
themselves  to  be  possessed  by  a  spirit,  to  be  the 
guardians  and  witnesses  of  a  truth,  to  be  the 
representatives  of  a  life,  which  the  dying  empire 
needed.  The  disciples  felt  the  stream  of  divine 
energy  which  issued  from  their  Lord's  new 
opened  grave.  They  were  touched  by  the  spir- 
itual hands  of  celestial  powers ;  they  went  forth 
in  their  weakness  perpetual  victors,  even  in 
martyrdom.      When     Jesus    told     His    first   fol- 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIAXITV.  87 

lowers  of  the  least  of  all  seeds  which  sowed  in  a 
field  became  a  lodging  place  for  the  birds  of  the 
air,  He  described  the  outward  expansion  of  His 
4cingdom ;  its  growth  from  land  to  land,  the 
writings  of  its  sacred  books  in  the  tongues  not 
only  of  priestly  Jerusalem  and  scholarly  Athens 
and  militant  Rome,  but  also  in  the  speech  of 
Teuton  and  Celt,  of  Arab  and  Malay,  of  Mon- 
golian and  western  savage  tribes,  and  above  all 
in  the  tongue  of  the  world-colonizing  Saxon. 
And  in  His  parable  He  gave  them  a  prophetic 
suggestion  of  the  missionary  conquests  which 
passed  out  of  the  gates  of  the  Holy  City,  by  the 
ancient  well  of  Samaria  and  the  shell-spangled 
shores  of  Genesareth,  eastward  to  flowery  Damas- 
cus, westward  to  the  coasts  of  Cyprus,  to  the 
harbor  of  opulent  Corinth,  still  westward  to  Italy 
and  Spain,  and  northward  through  German  for- 
ests, across  channels  and  stormy  expanses,  till 
they  touched  the  utmost  isles  of  the  Hebrides, 
uplifting  and  transfiguring  and  humanizing  the 
life  that  it  reached,  until,  after  long  centuries,  we 
see  Columbus  carrying  in  his  great  heart  the 
embryo  future  of  a  new  Christian  world,  Colum- 
bus, the  heroic  pulse  of  all  mankind  beating  in 
his  soul,  planting  the  Cross-banner  in  "far-off  At- 
lantic Seas,"  upon  islands  of  which  the  Apostles 
had  never  dreamed,  and  opening  to  the  bene- 
ficent results  of  the  Gospel  the  vast  continents 
which  even  now  house  and  nurture  a  large  por- 
tion of   that  race  for  whom  Jesus  lived  and  died. 


88     CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGIOX. 

But  Christianity  has  been  the  leaven  as  well  as 
the  seed.  Its  work  has  not  been  merely  expan- 
sive, the  enlargement  of  its  dominion  from  age 
to  age,  it  has  been  also  intensive  and  spiritual. 
It  has  been  fruitful  with  divine  activities,  invisi- 
ble like  all  the  greatest  things,  and  carrying  on 
unseen  transfigurations.  It  has  been  noiseless 
like  light,  energetic  like  life,  spiritually  trans- 
forming like  love,  a  blessed  and  impalpable  con- 
tagion spreading  from  heart  to  heart,  as  well  as 
a  celestial  kingdom  extending  from  land  to  land.^ 

The  Christian  victory  over  Greek  and  Roman 
heathenism  (as  I  have  already  intimated),  was 
never  complete,  and  Christianity  soon  met  an- 
other foe  to  be  changed  into  a  friend,  the  energy 
of  Northern  barbarism.  The  Roman  poets  and 
profligates 

"  Shrank  with  a  shudder  from  the  blue-eyed  race, 
Whose  force  rough-handed  should  renew  the  world, 
And  from  the  dregs  of  Romulus  express 
Such  wine  as  Dante  poured." 

That  race  swept  down  on  the  Empire;  the 
Christian  preacher  and  the  German  savage  came 
face  to  face,  and  it  may  be  said  that  for  ten 
centuries,  and  more,  the  Church  of  Christ  was 
fearfully  involved  with  the  corruptions  of  Rome, 
and  in  strenuous  conflict  with  the  ferocities  of  a 
half-tamed  barbarism  prevailing  throughout  what 
are  to-day  the  leading  nations  of  Europe.  The 
Church,  itself  only  partly  Christian,  attempted  to 

'Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  7. 


EFFECTS   OF  CHRISTIANITT.  89 

absorb  the  Roman,  and  to  dominate  the  Gothic 
world.  From  the  empire  the  bishop  caught  its 
cherished  ambition  for  universal  outward  su- 
premacy. The  despotism  of  the  Papacy  and  its 
bondage  to  antiquated  forms  were  legacies  of  the 
ancient  imperialism.  As  we  read  the  history  of 
the  Middle  Ages,  and  remember  that  the  Church 
was  built  on  the  ruins  of  the  old  and  newer 
paganism,  we  feel  that  Christianity,  as  it  lay  in 
the  heart  of  Jesus  Christ,  received  a  very  imper- 
fect illustration.  And  yet  its  fruits  were  not 
wanting.  Slavery  was  gradually  destroyed; 
womanhood  was  delivered  in  large  measure  from 
degradation  and  eastern  seclusion  ;  learning  flour- 
ished, at  least  among  the  few;  and  the  seeds  of 
it  were  kept  for  the  new  sowings  and  harvestings 
which  were  to  come.  Christianity,  thus  smoth- 
ered and  perverted,  had  energy  enough  for  its 
own  regeneration. 

We  never  begin  to  understand  the  Christian 
religion  until  we  perceive  that  its  fundamental 
law  is  found  in  the  seed  to  which  Jesus  com- 
pared it.  This  is  the  law  of  life,  of  progress,  of 
development  and,  if  you  please,  I  will  add  with 
Rothe,  the  law  of  mutation.  There  is  a  sense 
in  which  Christianity  is  the  most  changeable,  be- 
cause the  most  progressive  of  all  faiths.  Christ, 
it  is  true,  left  much  that  was  unfinished,  and  the 
imperfect  beginnings  of  Christian  history  have 
been  contrasted  with  the  complete,  though  sim- 
ple system  of  Mohammed.     But,  it  seems  to  me. 


90    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

that  the  simplicity  and  completeness  of  Islam 
may  be  and  are  its  imperfection.  It  can  do  all 
that  lies  in  its  power  in  a  brief  time;  it  has  no 
infinite  perspectives,  no  prolonged  evolutions,  no 
prodigious  and  increasingly  fruitful  developments. 

Christianity  is  the  richest  of  religions,  the 
nursing  mother  of  all  the  higher  forms  of  moral 
and  spiritual  life.  Whatever  darkness  may 
gather  over  Christendom,  whatever  winter  may 
set  in,  the  sun  again  rises,  the  spring  time  again 
flourishes,  great  leaders  inspired  by  the  truths  of 
the  old  Gospel  go  back  to  the  original  precepts 
of  the  Nazarene  Prophet,  and  come  into  contact 
with  His  liberating  life.  Thus  rose  the  six- 
teenth century  Reformation.  The  Church  which 
had  held  the  torch  of  knowledge  above  the  flood 
of  mediaeval  barbarism,  and  saved  the  records  of 
Biblical  and  classical  literature  to  be  the  seeds  of 
modern  refinement  and  humanity,  was  itself 
renewed.  Free  thought,  the  right  to  investi- 
gate truth,  individual  inquiry,  deliverance  from 
priestly  domination,  and  all  the  marvels  of 
modern  science  have  been  the  legitimate  out- 
growths of  that  great  reforming  era,  which 
brought  a  multitude  of  men  not  only  back  to 
the  simple  divine  truths  of  the  Christian  Gospel, 
but  into  living  connection  once  more  with  the 
ever-living  Lord. 

We  gain  our  truest  insight  into  Christianity 
when  we  think  of  its  fundamental  law  as  the  law 
of   life.      We   are  told  that  the  keynote   of    Bud- 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITY.  9 1 

dhism  is  the  teaching  that  beyond  and  above 
every  virtue  is  the  emotionless  frame  of  mind, 
which  neither  sorrows  nor  rejoices,  which  neither 
hates  nor  loves.  "There  is  no  hope  of  personal 
immortality  for  the  individual."  He  is  to  be 
swallowed  up  at  last.  "Reward  as  well  as  pun- 
ishment must  terminate,"  it  has  been  said.  "But 
so  long  as  men  do  good  they  deserve  reward,  as 
they  deserve  punishment  so  long  as  they  do 
evil."  According  to  Buddhism  works  of  all 
kinds  must  be  got  rid  of,  man's  highest  stage  is 
in  a  state  of  contemplative  abstraction  in  which 
nothing  is  done.  But  Christianity,  undertaking 
the  most  tremendous  tasks  for  man  and  for  so- 
ciety, and  eclipsing  all  other  faiths  in  its  confi- 
dent claims,  is  pre-eminently  a  religion  of 
abounding  life  and  divine  energy.  As  an 
American  scholar,  long  resident  in  Japan,  has 
vividly  said,  "Buddhism,  brought  face  to  face 
with  the  problem  of  the  world's  evil  and  possi- 
ble improvement,  evades  it;  begs  the  whole  ques- 
tion at  the  outset;  prays  'Deliver  us  from 
existence,  save  us  from  life,  and  give  us  as  little 
of  it  as  possible.'  Christianity  faces  the  prob- 
lem and  flinches  not ;  orders  advance  all  along 
the  line  of  endeavor,  and  prays  'Deliver  us 
from  evil;'  and  is  ever  of  good  cheer  because  its 
Captain  and  Leader  says,  'I  have  overcome  the 
world ;  go  win  it  for  me !  I  have  come  that  they 
might  have  life,  and  that  they  might  have  it 
more  abundantly.'  " 


92     CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

The  problem  with  Buddhism,  as  has  often 
been  pointed  out,  is  simply  "How  to  commit 
suicide,  not  of  that  pitiful  and  elusive  kind, 
which  rids  man  of  life  in  one  particular  form, 
but  which  rids  him  of  existence  in  every  form." 
Christianity  looks  upon  life  as  good,  and  aims  to 
put  into  it,  and  get  out  of  it,  the  greatest  possi- 
ble good ;  hence  its  law  of  progress  and  hope; 
hence  its  purpose  to  make  each  new  age  nobler 
than  the  last ;  each  new  life  better  than  the 
preceding  life,  every  great  moral  result  a  proph- 
ecy of  something  diviner.  Christendom  is  borne 
along,  like  a  great  craft  on  an  oceanic  stream, 
and  wherever  Christendom  is  most  vital  with 
truth  and  love,  the  swifter  is  the  advance.* 

Men  forget  the  origin  and  moulding  force  of 
progress  when  they  talk  complacently  about  the 
"nineteenth  century,"  and  bid  us  look  at 
"modern  civilization  "  as  our  great  benefactor, 
and  ask  us  to  cease  boasting  of  the  fruits  of 
Christianity.  But  go  to  central  China  where  the 
Gospel  has  not  penetrated.  There  is  no  nine- 
teenth century  there.  There  men  are  still  living 
in  the  fifth  century  before  Christ.  Where  is 
the  nineteenth  century  with  the  tribes  that 
swarm  and  suffer  beneath  the  burning  sun  of 
Africa,  or  among  the  people  of  the  Grand  Lama 
on  the  tableland  of  Thibet?  The  areas  where 
Christian  influences  prevail  in  Asiatic  lands  have 
seemed  to  me  oases  in  the  midst  of  deserts;   cen- 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  8. 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIAN fTT.  93 

ters  of  brilliant  radiance  in  the  midst  of  moral 
darkness.  Talk  about  the  progress  of  freedom ! 
The  line  of  its  progress  follows  straight  down 
from  Him  who  taught  the  brotherhood  of  man 
and  the  Fatherhood  of  God;  His  words  rang  the 
death-knell  of  slavery  in  the  Roman  Empire. 
Like  the  seeds  in  the  Colosseum,  and  the  vege- 
tation sprouting  between  the  bricks  in  the  palace 
of  the  Caesars,  gradually  disturbing  or  upturning 
the  old  foundations,  the  seed  which  Jesus  scat- 
tered has  upturned  and  destroyed  many  of  the 
debasing  tyrannies  of  the  past.  Feudalism  is 
gone;  serfdom  is  gone;  the  Bible  has  been  an 
emancipator;  its  seeds,  in  the  minds  of  WyclifT 
and  Huss,  of  Luther  and  the  German  Reform- 
ers, in  the  souls  of  Scotch  and  English  Puritans, 
were  wafted  from  the  trees  under  which  Jesus 
taught  on  the  slopes  of  Olivet.  A  chapter  in 
the  triumphs  of  Christianity  will  tell  how  the 
growth  of  free  institutions  is  directly  traceable 
from  the  great  Genevese  theologian,  John  Cal- 
vin, down  to  the  moral  leaders  of  the  present 
century;  it  can  be  shown  that  the  chief  heroes 
of  emancipation,  and  the  most  influential  of 
anti-slavery  reformers  were  men  who,  "bound 
the  Bible  to  their  brows."  To-day,  thanks  to 
the  Christian  spirit,  slavery  is  dead,  or  dying, 
the  world  over.  The  movement  which  gave 
freedom  and  self-government  to  civilized  nations 
was  sure  in  the  end  to  reach  the  lowest  of  our 
race.       "Christianity    promotes    movement,    ex- 


94     CHRISTIANITr,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

pansion,  growth.  Compare  Egypt,  Turkey  and 
Persia  with  Germany,  England  and  the  United 
States."  Christianity  prepares  men  even 
through  despotism  for  liberty,  through  tempor- 
ary restraint  for  freedom  and  progress.  Its 
spirit  is  so  vital  and  emancipating  that  when  even 
a  small  portion  of  Christian  truth  is  bound  up  in 
a  tyrannical  government,  secular  or  ecclesiastical, 
that  government  is  doomed.  On  account  of  its 
reforming  energy  Christian  civilization  rectifies 
its  mistakes.  The  expansion  of  Christendom  has 
been  attended  with  oppression  and  rapacity,  with 
the  plunder  of  the  innocent,  and  the  disregard  of 
many  human  rights,  but  it  is  the  glory  of  Chris- 
tianity that  regenerating  force  is  lodged  within 
it.  These  crimes  have  been  brought  to  the  bar 
of  Christendom,  and  have  been  condemned  by 
it.  Their  repetition  has  been  made  impossible. 
And  this  explains  why  the  peasant  of  Bengal  or 
Mysore  now  enjoys  the  same  rights  of  justice  and 
good  government  as  are  claimed  by  Englishmen. 
A  religion  like  Buddhism  where  the  law  of  life 
and  progress  is  feeble,  seems  speedily  to  reach 
its  limit  of  renewing  power.  Sir  Monier-Williams 
recounts  a  long  list  of  benefits  to  Asia  which 
Buddhism  for  several  centuries  rendered;  the 
introduction  of  education,  the  encouragement  of 
arts,  the  deprecation  of  war,  the  proclamation  of 
good-will,  sympathy  with  social  liberty,  the 
granting  of  some  independence  to  women,  the 
inculcation  of   generosity  and    tolerance,  the  for- 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITT.  95 

bidding  of  avarice,  the  advocacy  of  compassion, 
the  promotion  of  progress  to  a  certain  stage. 
This  is  a  brilliant  showing;  but,  on  the  other 
hand.  Buddhism  does  not  seem  to  have  per- 
manently elevated  the  lower  forms  of  civilization 
which  have  adopted  it.  It  has  not  given  expan- 
sion to  the  human  soul,  it  has  not  continually 
impelled  man  onward  in  the  track  of  general 
civilization  and  progress.  Can  the  purest  and 
best  results  be  expected  of  a  system  which  makes 
''celibacy  the  loftiest  state,  and  mendicancy  the 
highest  idea  of  life?" 

Greater  things  should  be  anticipated  from  a 
religion  like  the  Christian,  whose  Founder  fills 
his  followers  with  much  of  His  own  hopeful 
vigor.  While  He  laid  His  hand  in  blessing  on 
every  passive  grace.  He  expanded  the  human 
soul  with  the  inspiration  to  illustrate  all  the 
active  virtues  of  a  perfect  manhood. 

Christianity,  when  not  perverted  by  pessim- 
ism, points  its  followers  to  an  unspeakably  bet- 
ter earth,  "with  joy  and  love  triumphing  and 
fair  truth."  I  believe  that  one  of  the  most 
marked  contrasts  between  the  civilization  on 
which  Christ  has  put  his  stamp,  and  the  civilization 
of  Greece  and  Rome,  which  Christianity  displaced, 
or  the  civilization  of  much  of  the  Orient  to-day, 
is  the  hope  and  energy  which  rule  in  the  one, 
and  the  hopelessness  and  sloth  which  seem  to 
pervade  the  others. 

Now  that  men  are  beginning  to  see  the  might 


96     CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  majesty  and  sure-coming  victory  of  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven,  it  becomes  more  difficult 
for  Christian  believers  to  sink  into  the  slough  of 
pessimism. 

We  study  Christianity  intelligently,  only  when 
we  see  it  claiming  the  whole  of  humanity,  and 
the  whole  of  man  as  the  field  of  its  redeeming 
activities,  planning  the  redemption  of  the  indi- 
vidual and  the  uplifting  of  society.  For  the 
individual,  it  emphasizes  neither  the  inner  nor 
the  outer  life,  in  such  wise  as  to  leave  human 
nature  ill-balanced.  It  would  develop  simultane- 
ously all  the  various  forces  of  the  human  spirit, 
and  not  minister  to  thought  at  the  expense  of 
emotion,  nor  to  meditation  at  the  expense  of 
active  energy.  It  is  not  surprising  that  all  the 
great  music  of  the  world  is  the  outcome  of 
Christianity.  It  is  not  surprising  that  every 
department  of  mental  and  spiritual  greatness  and 
excellence  has  been  illustrated  in  Christian  civili- 
zation. In  these  recent  centuries  the  Christian 
religion,  which  has  been  concerned  chiefly  with 
the  individual  spirit,  is  directing  its  energies  as 
well  to  the  social  progress  of  mankind.  It  is 
adding  new  stars  to  its  crown  of  triumph  in  new 
emancipations,  mitigating  the  horrors  of  war, 
and  diffusing  beyond  its  own  boundaries  the 
growing  spirit  of  humanity  and  brotherhood.  I 
regard  the  social  discontent  found  in  nations  to- 
day as  very  largely  the  spirit  of  Jesus  Christ, 
demanding  that   His  law  of  love  be  still  further 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITT.  97 

pervasive  in  human  affairs.  And,  if  we  go  out- 
side the  domain  of  Christendom,  we  find  the 
Gospel  is  modifying  the  ideas  and  usages  of 
non-Christian  peoples  through  the  world-wide 
missionary  movements  of  our  time.  Commerce 
is  a  penetrating  force  and  a  unifying  power,  and 
the  Christian's  Bible  goes  with  the  English  and 
American  ship  to  every  shore.  A  chapter  not 
yet  written  would  indicate  what  these  prepara- 
tory movements  have  wrought  in  Asia,  not  only 
where  the  crescent  rules;  not  only  where  Mo- 
hammedans have  been  led  by  the  force  of 
Christian  example  to  educate  their  daughters, 
and  by  the  pressure  of  Christian  Governments  to 
take  some  initial  steps  toward  reform ;  not  only 
in  Japan,  who  wins  her  victories  clad  in  the  edu- 
cational and  military  panoply  of  Christian  na- 
tions; but  also  here  where  reforming  sect  after 
sect  has  risen,  and  where  Hinduism  seems  now 
to  claim  as  its  own  the  spirit  and  truth  which  we 
believe  have  come  from  Bible  lands  and  Biblical 
civilization.  Christianity  has  been  a  leaven  enter- 
ing into  the  life  of  nations ;  it  has  greatly  affected 
the  political  relationships  of  men ;  it  has  com- 
pelled governments  to  be  less  despotic  and  more 
humane ;  it  has  reversed  the  maxims  of  ancient 
society,  and  made  men,  not  the  appendages  and 
slaves  of  the  state,  but  the  rightful  recipients  of 
whatever  services  governments  might  render;  it 
has  modified  the  relations  which  whole  peoples 
sustain    to    one    another.       However    belligerent 


9S    CHR/STI AN/TV,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION'. 

the  nations  may  seem  to-day,  the  chronic  and 
continuing  wars  of  ancient  pagan  societies  have 
given  way  to  an  attitude  more  humane  and 
peaceful.  Two  and  a  half  centuries  ago  the 
Dutch  juris-consult,  Hugo  Grotius,  the  Christian 
theologian  whom  Henry  of  Navarre  called  the 
"Miracle  of  Holland,"  published  his  book  on  the 
law  of  war  and  peace,  which  roused  Europe  to 
some  faint  sense  of  international  obligation. 
Governments  began  to  see  that  treachery  and 
battle  and  conquest  do  not  exhaust  the  relations 
which  they  might  rightly  bear  to  one  another. 
The  light  which  touched  the  mind  of  Grotius 
reached  other  minds.  A  body  of  international 
law  has  come  into  being,  and  in  recent  years  the 
conviction  has  grown  that  arbitration  should  take 
the  place  of  the  iron-clad  and  the  dynamite-gun, 
in  settling  international  disputes;  and  within  a 
few  years  our  American  Capital  has  witnessed 
the  gathering  of  men  representing  seventeen 
nationalities  of  the  New  World  from  Behring  Sea 
to  the  Straits  of  Magellan,  met  to  confer  in  the 
interests  of  international  peace,  and  themselves 
the  heralds  of  that  coming  congress,  which  shall 
be  "the  Federation  of  the  World." 

And  a  distinctive  feature  of  Christian  civiliza- 
tion is  this,  that  more  and  more  it  brings  its 
highest  blessings  to  every  class  of  men,  and  does 
not  reserve  its  choicest  favors,  like  the  Republic 
of  Plato,  for  a  limited  oligarchy,  dominant  over 
a  nation   of  slaves.     The  spirit   of  caste  is  to  it 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITY.  99 

supremely  abhorrent,  even  more  so  than  it  would 
have  been  to  the  early  sacred  poets  who  wrote 
the  Vedas.  Christianity  gave  the  transforming 
of  the  Roman  World  into  the  hands  of  a  com- 
pany of  Jewish  fishermen,  men  of  common 
mould,  and  it  changed  them  into  the  princes  of 
God.  Paul  speaks  of  things  that  are  despised, 
bringing  to  naught  the  pride  of  man.  It  has 
been  said  of  Celsus,  the  earliest  literary  assailant 
of  the  Christian  faith,  that  he  was  "a  very  wise 
man,  a  physician,  and  philosopher,  the  true 
child  of  culture,  proud  of  the  manners,  the 
speech,  the  daintiness  and  delicacy  of  the  culti- 
vated." We  hear  him  say,  "See  what  a  set  of 
men  these  Christians  are!  The  teachers  of  our 
noble  philosophies  in  our  academies  are  culti- 
vated gentlemen,  acquainted  with  the  best 
thoughts  of  the  best  thinkers,  and  able  to  give 
them  fit,  because  elegant,  expression ;  but  these 
Christian  preachers,  why  they  are  fishermen,  and 
publicans,  and  weavers,  and  cobblers,  ignorant 
Jews,  illiterate  Greeks,  the  veriest  barbarians, 
enthusiasts,  without  the  gift  of  refined  thought 
or  cultured  speech."  We  behold  some  remnants 
of  Celsus  in  the  feelings  which  dainty  culture 
expresses  toward  the  earnest  Christian  evangel- 
ism of  our  day.  But  what  of  these  criticisms? 
Let  us  take  Celsus  at  his  word,  accepting  his 
testimony  as  true,  and  what  then?  "Does  he 
not  become,"  as  Dr.  Fairbairn  writes,  "one  of 
the  oldest,   though  most  unconscious,  witnesses 


lOO    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

to  the  power  of  Christ?  It  was  a  new  thing  in 
the  history  and  experience  of  men,  that  men, 
such  as  Celsus  described,  should  become  grander 
and  mightier  than  any  known  to  his  academies, 
possessed  of  ideas  as  to  God,  as  to  man  and  so- 
ciety and  the  state,  subHmer  than  Plato  ever  im- 
agined, men  wiser  in  their  notions  of  civil  rights 
and  political  duties  than  Solon,  dreaming  of 
more  splendid  achievements  than  ever  dawned 
on  the  soul  of  Alexander  or  of  Caesar,  working 
at  the  foundations  of  a  city  infinitely  nobler  in 
ideal,  as  it  was  to  be  incomparably  grander  in 
history,  than  the  city  Athene  loved  and  shielded, 
or  the  city  Romulus  founded,  and  Jove  guided 
to  universal  empire." 

Open  the  pages  of  the  Roman  historians,  and 
you  will  find  there  pictures  of  the  Roman 
nobility,  looking  upon  their  slaves  as  so  many 
cattle,  murdering  them  with  impunity,  using 
their  bodies  to  fatten  the  lampreys  in  their  lakes, 
pitting  them  against  tigers  in  the  amphitheater. 
Open  the  pages  of  the  early  Christian  historians, 
and  you  will  see  the  Roman  nobility  and  their 
slaves  sitting  down  as  brethren  at  the  Lord's 
table.  It  was  the  doctrine  of  Jesus,  concerning 
the  equal  humanity  of  all  men,  which  reversed 
the  maxims  of  philosophy,  and  gave  the  litera- 
ture of  heaven  to  men  whom  Plato  excluded 
from  his  "Academy"  and  condemned  in  his 
"Republic  "  to  menialness  and  brutality.  And 
what   an   immense    and    glorious    revolution  the 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANTTV.  lOl 

Christian  doctrine  has  effected  in  the  thought 
and  Hterature  of  the  world!  It  is  not  rank  or 
place  or  princely  wealth  that  gives  dignity  and 
grace  to  the  characters  whom  the  masters  of  our 
imaginative  art  unveil  to  us.  The  verse  of 
Robert  Burns  has  made  an  entrance  for  all  the 
world  beneath  the  low  roof  of  the  Scottish  peas- 
ant, and  the  family  worship  of  the  "Cotter's 
Saturday  Night  "  may  bring  us  as  near  to  God 
as  a  gorgeous  service  intoned  within  cathedral 
walls.  The  spiritual  influence  and  consolation 
which  Christianity  has  brought  to  the  poor  are 
not  greater  than  the  ennoblement  it  brings  to 
our  conceptions  of  man,  in  lifting  us  above  bond- 
age to  the  formal  and  external.  The  soul  is 
sovereign  over  rank  and  dress,  and  the  highest 
art  of  a  Christian  age  finds  passion  and  suffering, 
love  and  joy,  as  significant  and  sublime  among 
the  miners  of  Cornwall  and  the  huts  of  Ireland 
as  in  the  drawing-rooms  of  London ;  amid  the 
slave  cabins  of  Louisiana  as  along  the  brilliant 
boulevards  of  Paris;  in  Millet's  portraiture  of 
the  Norman  peasantry  as  in  Paul  Veronese's 
gorgeous  pictures  of  Venetian  splendor. 

There  have  been  no  tribes  so  distant  and  so 
debased  that  the  touch  of  Christ's  hand  has  not 
reached  them  and  lifted  them  into  manhood. 
The  impossible  in  the  case  of  the  brutal  Hotten- 
tot and  the  native  Australian  has  been  realized. 
It  is  not  a  Christian  missionary,  but  Charles  Dar- 
win, the  greatest  name  in  science  since  Sir  Isaac 


I02    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Newton,  it  is  Darwin,  himself  a  contributor  to 
Christian  missions,  who  wrote  of  the  Tahitians, 
that  human  sacrifices,  unparalleled  profligacy, 
infanticide  and  bloody  wars  have  been  abolished, 
and  that  dishonesty,  intemperance  and  licentious- 
ness have  been  greatly  reduced  by  the  introduc- 
tion of  Christianity.  I  might  tell  the  story  of 
special  triumphs,  like  that  in  Madagascar,  where 
the  Bible  has  been  enthroned,  moral  abomina- 
tions largely  uprooted,  education  diffused,  and  a 
hundred  thousand  souls  gathered  into  Christian 
churches.  I  might  ask  you  to  look  to  far  off 
Melanesia,  with  Fiji  as  its  center,  and  note  the 
fact  that  out  of  a  population  of  a  hundred  and 
twenty  thousand,  not  long  since  cannibals,  a 
hundred  thousand  have  been  reached,  and  are 
now  worshipers  in  Christian  assemblies;  or  I 
might  tell  you  how  the  power  of  the  ever-living 
Gospel  in  the  heart  of  Robert  Moffatt  gave  to 
the  degraded  Bechuana  tribes  trade,  literature 
and  civilization.  Or,  I  might  sketch  the  move- 
ment in  Mussulman  lands,  which  has  touched 
with  the  radiance  of  the  Cross  the  Lebanon  and 
Persian  mountains,  as  well  as  the  waters  of  the 
Bosporus,  and  which  is  the  sure  harbinger  of 
the  day  when  Cairo  and  Damascus  and  Teheran 
shall  be  the  servants  of  Jesus,  and  when  even 
the  solitudes  of  Arabia  shall  be  pierced,  and 
Christ,  in  the  person  of  His  disciples,  shall  enter 
the  Kaaba  of  Mecca,  and  the  whole  truth  shall 
at  last  be  there  spoken,  "This  is  eternal  life  that 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIAN  ITT.  103 

they  might   know  Thee,  the   only  true   God,  and 
Jesus  Christ  whom  Thou  hast  sent." 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  deny  or  to  behttle 
the  beneficent  results  of  the  other  faiths.  But 
while  determined  to  see  the  good,  how  great  is 
the  good  which  can  be  discovered?  "Buddhism 
has  made  Asia  mild,"  we  are  told,  but  it  is  not 
the  general  impression  that  where  it  prevails  it 
has  made  Asia  moral.  "While  Buddhism,"  as 
a  recent  writer  has  said,  "made  Chinese  Asia 
gentle  in  manners  and  kind  to  animals,  it  cov- 
ered the  land  with  temples,  monasteries  and  im- 
ages; on  the  other  hand  the  religion  of  Jesus 
filled  Europe  not  only  with  churches  and  abbeys, 
monasteries  and  nunneries,  but  also  with  hos- 
pitals, orphan  asylums,  lighthouses,  schools  and 
colleges."  Furthermore,  while  India  has  been 
an  immense  theater  for  the  activity  and  con- 
tention of  all  the  religions  which  are  really  great, 
while  it  has  been  the  museum  and  the  encyclo- 
paedia, and  the  reservoir,  of  these  faiths,^  would 
it  be  diiificult  to  establish  a  claim,  which  is  often 
made  that  Christianity,  directly  and  indirectly, 
"has  done  more  for  the  elevation  in  certain  re- 
spects of  Hindu  society  in  the  last  eighty  years 
than  the  other  religions  have  accomplished  in  all 
the  ages  of  their  dominion?"'"  Much  may  be 
said  in  praise  of  Confucianism,  but  it  has  not 
been  progressive,  it  has  not  been  in  a  high  sense 

'Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  9. 
'"Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  10. 


104    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

religious,  and  it  has  sacrificed  man  to  the  social 
order.  And  nothing  more  is  needed  to  show 
that  Mohammedanism  is  only  a  temporary  halt- 
ing-place in  human  progress,  than  the  engrafting 
of  polygamy  into  its  fundamental  ideas  and  per- 
manent system.  A  Scotch  theologian  has  well 
said,  "that  polygamy  may  suit  a  race  in  a  certain 
stage  of  its  development,  and  may  in  that  stage, 
lead  to  purer  living  and  surer  moral  growth  than 
its  prohibition,  may  be  granted.  But,  neces- 
sarily, a  religion  which  incorporates  in  its  code 
of  morals  any  such  allowances,  stamps  itself  as 
something  short  of  the  final  religion.""  Pro- 
fessor Max  MiJller,  the  most  famous  of  all  the 
students  on  these  themes,  has  said  that,  "how- 
ever highly  we  prize  our  Christianity  we  never 
prize  it  highly  enough  until  we  have  compared 
it  with  the  religions  of  the  rest  of  the  world." 

Men  realize  that  in  the  stress  and  interchange 
of  modern  civilization  the  best  religion  must 
come  to  the  front.  It  is  the  mission  of  Chris- 
tianity to  draw  nations  out  of  their  seclusion,  to 
generate  eager  inquiry  throughout  all  the  world. 
The  non-Christian  faiths  are  not  permitted  to 
remain  at  ease,  and  the  ultimate  result  of  the 
agitation  seems  to  me  not  in  the  least  uncertain. 

Our  survey  makes  it  clear  that  if  we  should 
take  away  from  modern  civilization  the  intel- 
lectual, the  moral,  the  spiritual,  and  the  social 
effects  which  have  come,  directly  and  indirectly, 

"Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  ii. 


EFFECTS    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  105 

from  the  spirit  and  teaching  of  Jesus  Christ, 
there  would  be  Httle  left  to  distinguish  us  from 
that  vast  ocean  of  cruelty,  superstition,  and  despair 
in  which  went  down  the  sun  of  Rome.  Take 
out  of  modern  life  the  forces  which  make  for 
liberty  and  order,  for  enlightenment,  progress 
and  brotherhood,  which  owe  their  origin  to  the 
spiritual  dynamics  of  the  Christian  Gospel,  and 
the  area  of  moral  darkness  would  be  vastly 
widened,  the  domain  of  spiritual  hope  and  splen- 
dor would  be  so  shrunken  and  obscured  that  men 
everywhere  would  be  dreaming  of  a  fabulous 
golden  past  instead  of  toiling  for  an  actualized 
golden  future.  Marred  and  blackened  though 
our  civilization  is,  the  law  of  progress,  the  law 
of  life,  the  law  of  hope  run  their  golden  threads 
through  its  entire  organism.  We  are  not  mov- 
ing in  fatal  cycles  round  and  round,  coming  back 
to  the  same  place,  and  making  no  true  advance. 
An  increasing  purpose  runs  through  the  Christian 
ages.  And,  in  spite  of  a  backward  turning  now 
and  then,  the  stream  rolls  forward  its  fertilizing 
flood,  with  such  force  that  obstacles  do  not  pre- 
vail against  it.  Indeed  the  energy  of  this  ad- 
vancing life  argues  the  supernatural  origin  which 
the  church  has  always  claimed  for  Christianity. 
It  may  well  be  believed  that  if  the  head-sources 
of  the  River  of  Salvation  were  found  in  some 
foot-hills  which  have  but  a  slight  elevation  above 
the  plain,  if  our  Religion  had  its  origin  in  one 
who   ranks   in    being,  only  with    the    founders  of 


Io6    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

other  faiths,  there  would  not  be  force  enough  to 
push  the  stream  of  redemption  with  such  vigor 
and  volume  over  the  long,  wide,  desert  wastes  of 
human  history.  May  we  not  believe  that  be- 
cause the  Fountain  Head  of  the  Gospel  is  high 
up  among  the  eternal  hills  of  God,  because  the 
stream  issues  from  beneath  the  cross  and  tomb 
of  a  divine  Saviour,  nothing  has  been  able  in 
nineteen  centuries  of  strenuous  antagonism  to 
withstand  its  progress  or,  at  least,  permanently, 
to  push  it  aside?  I  would  that  Christendom 
were  better,  but  compared  with  the  non-Chris- 
tian world  it  appears  to  me  as  noon-day  to  dark- 
ness, and  before  my  observations  of  Oriental  life 
I  never  realized  so  keenly  the  truth  of  Tenny- 
son's line: 
"  Better  fifty  years  of  Europe  than  a  cycle  of  Cathay." 

The  development  of  Eastern  civilization  has 
continued  through  more  centuries  than  there  are 
decades  in  my  own  country.  If  this  long  de- 
velopment has  produced  results  far  inferior  to 
those  of  our  brief  American  history,  India  should 
seriously  ask  the  reason  why.'^  And  if  the  fruits 
of  Christianity  have  not  been  worthy  of  its 
Founder,  and  commensurate  with  its  opportuni- 
ties, still  they  have  been  so  wondrous  and  world- 
wide that,  to  some  minds,  they  furnish  a  more 
persuasive  argument  than  the  most  skillful  apolo- 
getic. We  feel  that  Christendom,  on  the  whole, 
demands  a  favorable  judgment   for   the  Christian 

^2  Appendix,  Lecture  II,  Note  12. 


EFFECTS    OF  CHRISTIANITY.  107 

faith.  We  feel,  with  St.  Hilaire,  that  "to  con- 
demn Christianity,  one  must  fail  to  comprehend 
it."  Seen  in  its  true  spirit,  apprehended  as  the 
fulfiUment  of  all  the  best  thoughts  and  aspira- 
tions of  what  Schelling  has  called  the  "wild- 
growing  religions,"  grasped  in  its  central  Power 
and  Person,  we  believe  that  Christianity  will  yet 
appear  to  the  disciples  of  Buddha,  Confucius  and 
Mohammed,  and  to  the  worshipers  of  Krishna, 
in  its  peerless  supremacy  and  distinctive  char- 
acter, and  that  they  will  be  ready  to  exclaim, 
with  the  greatest  of  Christian  Apostles,  "When 
that  which  is  perfect  is  come,  then  that  which  is 
in  part  shall  be  done  away. 


CHRISTIAN    THEISM,    AS   THE    BASIS 
OF   A    UNIVERSAL    RELIGION. 


Our  Father  which  art  in  heaven,  hallowed  be  thy  name. — 
Matthew  vi:  9. 

Is  God  the  God  of  Jews  only  ?  Is  He  not  the  God  of  the 
nations  also  ?     Yea,  of  the  nations  also. — Romans  iii:  29. 

Grade  der  Pantheismus  kann  dem  unbedingten  Werthe 
der  sittlichen  Arbeit  niemals  gerecht  werden.  Die  Wissen- 
schaft  aber  muss  in  dem  Streite  zwischen  Pantheismus  und 
Theismum  ihre  vollstandige  Incompetenz  zugestehen. — 
Christliche  Apologetik  von  Dr.  Harm.  Schultz,  p.  18. 

The  water  of  stagnant  Buddhism  is  still  a  swarming  mass, 
which  needs  cleansing  to  purity  by  a  knowledge  of  one  God 
who  is  Light  and  Love.  Without  such  knowledge,  the 
manifold  changes  in  Buddhism  will  but  form  fresh  chap- 
ters of  degradation  and  decay. — The  Religions  of  Japan, 
Griffis,  p.  223. 

Theology  has  no  falser  idea  than  that  of  the  impassability 
of  God.  If  He  is  capable  of  sorrow.  He  is  capable  of  suf- 
fering; and  were  he  without  the  capacity  for  either,  He 
would  be  without  any  feeling  of  the  evil  of  sin  or  the 
misery  of  man.  The  very  truth  that  came  by  Jesus  Christ 
may  be  said  to  be  summed  up  in  the  passability  of  God. — 
The  Place  of  God  in  Modern  Theology,  Fairbairn,  p.  483. 

No  !  such  a  God  my  worship  may  not  win. 
Who  lets  the  world  about  his  finger  spin, 
A  thing  extern  ;  my  God  must  rule  within, 
And  whom  I  own  for  Father,  God,  Creator, 
Hold  nature  in  himself,  himself  in  nature; 
And  in  his  kindly  arms  embraced,  the  whole 
Doth  live  and  move  by  his  pervading  soul. 

— Goethe. 


THIRD    LECTURE. 

CHRISTIAN    THEISM,    AS   THE    BASIS    OF   A 
UNIVERSAL    RELIGION. 

I  have  often  looked,  with  profound  emotion, 
in  one  of  the  parks  of  my  own  city,  on  St.  Gau- 
dens's  famous  statue  of  Lincohi,  whose  uncon- 
genial task  it  was  to  employ  the  national  power 
against  his  own  countrymen ;  he  stands  there  be- 
fore us,  "with  malice  toward  none,  with  charity 
for  all  "  beaming  from  his  sad  and  thoughtful 
face ;  and  I  have  felt  that  there  is  in  the  man 
thus  embodied  something  diviner  than  the  power 
symbolized  by  the  folded  fasces  behind  him, 
something  greater  than  the  wise  logic  with  which 
he  is  about  to  speak.  There  is  a  majestic  ten- 
derness, which  left  out  of  its  comprehensive  be- 
nevolence no  one  of  his  people,  down  to  the 
assassin  that  slew  him  and  to  the  slave  that  saw 
in  him  an  earthly  saviour.  But  in  the  temple 
of  God's  Word,  according  to  devout  Christian 
faith,  another  and  greater  statue  is  unveiled  for 
the  glad  eyes  of  all  mankind.  The  living  em- 
bodiment of  God's  forgiving  and  long-suffering 
mercy  is  there  disclosed.  Divine  love  has  been 
revealed  and  crowned ;  not  its  physical  embodi- 
ment, as  by  the  Trojan  prince  on  Mount  Ida  of 


112    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

old,  not  the  heavenly  maiden  of  the  mystic's 
vision,  bending  above  the  bars  of  Paradise;  but 
love's  divinest  self.  We  behold  her  transcend- 
ent beauty,  with  which  not  for  a  moment  is  to 
be  compared  the  earthly  loveliness  of  the  Grecian 
Helen, 

"  The  face  that  launched  a  thousand  ships 
And  burned  the  topless  towers  of  Ilium." 

We  see  in  her  a  love  that  agonizes  to  bless 
even  through  suffering.  Words  of  forgiveness 
seem  breaking  from  her  lips;  her  eyes  are  founts 
of  compassion,  and  though  at  her  feet  rest  the 
thunderbolts  of  omnipotence,  and  her  brow  is 
radiant  with  the  awful  diadem  of  celestial  holi- 
ness, we  see  the  fingers  of  her  hand  whitening 
around  the  Cross,  and  we  bow  before  her  as  the 
emancipator  and  redeemer  of  the  soul  and  the 
queenly  sovereign  of  all  mankind.  The  victories 
of  Christianity  have  been  the  triumphs  of  the 
Cross — the  conquests  of  the  God  of  Redemption. 
The  proposition  which  I  offer  to-day  is  this: 
that  the  Christian  theism  thus  hinted  at,  the 
doctrine  of  God  contained  in  the  Scriptures,  is 
an  adequate  basis  for  a  Universal  Religion.  The 
God  who  is  the  Universal  Father  is  a  boon  to  all 
the  world.  The  God  who  is  one  mind,  of  abso- 
lute perfection,  is  a  blessing  to  peoples  still  dis- 
tracted and  degraded  by  polytheism.  The  God 
who  is  personal  and  holy  needs  to  be  known  by 
those  still  shrouded  in  the  mists  of  pantheism. 
The  God  who  is  merciful  as  well  as  mighty,  and 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  113 

whose  mercy  has  been  revealed  and  personalized 
in  the  redeeming  Christ,  has  a  mission  of  un- 
speakable good  to  all  who,  consciously  or  uncon- 
sciously, are  sunk  in  guilt,  error  and  degrada- 
tion. The  God  who  became  incarnate  that  men 
might  at  last  know  His  nature,  and  gain  spiritual 
restoration,  release  and  harmony,  is  the  fulfill- 
ment of  the  prayers  and  hopes  and  vague  long- 
ings of  a  hundred  peoples  and  a  hundred  genera- 
tions of  men. 

I  have  thus  far  argued  the  Universalism  of 
Christianity  from  its  present  aspects,  as  the  only 
religion  flourishing  among  all  races  and  nations; 
and  from  its  beneficent  and  world-wide  effects. 
Our  theme  to-day  requires  that  we  should  look 
into  the  varied  and  fragmentary  conceptions  of 
God  which  have  prevailed  in  other  faiths  as  find- 
ing, so  far  as  they  are  true,  a  perfect  fulfillment 
in  Christian  theism.  It  requires,  especially,  that 
we  should  clearly  understand  what  are  the  dis- 
tinctive, or,  at  least,  the  supreme  elements  in  the 
Christian  revelation  of  God,  as  now  taught  by 
the  instructed  minds  of  Christendom.  The  lierht 
which  will  thus  be  thrown  on  our  fundamental 
proposition  that  Christianity  alone  is  the  world- 
religion  will  not,  I  earnestly  believe,  be  found 
feeble  and  flickering.  It  is  interesting  to  note 
that  already,  in  the  non-Christian  faiths,  among 
enlightened  spirits,  there  is  an  eager  disposition 
to  claim  the  Christian  doctrine  of  the  divine 
Fatherhood.      The   newest    Hinduism,  traversing 


114     CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

two  millenniums   of  polytheism,  recalls  the  early 
Aryan    Dyaush-Pitar  —  the    Sanskrit     Heavenly 
Father,     corresponding    with     Zeus     Pater    and 
Jupiter — and  erects  into  living  form  this  primeval 
foreshadowing  of  Christ's   Pater-noster.      We  all 
remember    that    the    Congress    of   the    World's 
Faiths  asserted  "with  a  most  marked  conviction 
and    reiteration    the    Fatherhood     of     God,    the 
brotherhood    of   man,  and    the   solidarity  of   the 
race."      As  one  participant   has  said,  "It  united 
often  in  the    Lord's   prayer,  and    by  implication 
committed  itself  to  the   universal    religion  which 
that    universal   prayer   expresses."      As    another 
participant   in   that   Parliament   has  written,  "It 
intensified    the    conviction    that    our    God    is    no 
geographical  Deity,  like  the  local  gods  of  Egypt, 
the  tribal  gods   of   Greece,  the   pantheon  gods  of 
Rome,  the  national  gods   of  Palestine,  the  eccle- 
siastical God  of  Christendom."      And  it  requires 
no  prophet  to  see  that   Divine  Fatherhood,  more 
or   less    clearly   apprehended,    will    yet    be    pro- 
claimed as  a  tenet  of  all  the  historic  faiths.     You 
may  recall  the  legend  of  the  Christian  and  the  Jew 
who  once  entered  a  Persian  temple  and  saw  there 
the  sacred  fire.      You  remember  that  the  Jew  in- 
quired of  the  Parsi  priest,  "Do  you  worship  the 
fire?"      "Not  the  fire,"  was   the   answer;    "it  is 
only   an    emblem    of    the    sun."      "But    do   you 
worship    the   sun?"      "No;   that   is   but  the  em- 
blem   of   the    invisible   light  which   preserves   all 
things."      Then   the   Persian  inquired,  "How  do 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  II5 

you  name  the  Supreme  Being?"  And  the 
IsraeHte  answered,  "We  call  Him  Jehovah 
Adonai,  the  Lord  which  was,  and  is,  and  shall 
be."  "Your  word  is  great  and  glorious,"  said 
the  Persian,  "but  it  is  terrible."  Then  the 
Christian  approached  and  said,  "We  call  him 
Abba,  Father."  Whereupon  the  Jew  and  the 
Gentile  eyed  each  other  in  surprise,  and  said, 
"Your  word  is  nearest  and  highest,  but  who  gave 
you  the  courage  to  call  the  Eternal  thus?" 
"The  Father  Himself,"  was  the  answer;  and 
then  he  explained  to  them  the  Gospel  of  Re- 
demption, and  they  believed  and  raised  their 
eyes  to  Heaven  and  said,  "Our  Father,"  and 
joining  hands  called  each  other  brethren.  This 
legend  became  at  the  Congress  of  the  Creeds 
historic  fact.  And  the  fact  is  surely  prophetic, 
and  must  give  every  expounder  and  preacher  of 
Scriptural  theism  a  new  feeling  of  the  fitness  of 
His  Gospel  to  meet  the  deepest  wants  of  the 
whole  race. 

No  Christian  Apostle  or  Missionary,  I  think, 
ever  went  to  a  non-Christian  people  without  the 
feeling  that  he  had  a  knowledge  of  God  purer, 
higher,  completer  than  has  ever  been  obtained  or 
held  with  vigorous  faith  by  the  most  famous  of 
non-Christian  saints  and  philosophers.  Some 
scholars  have  held  that  the  Stoic  conceptions  of 
God  and  duty,  as  taught  by  Seneca,  were  strik- 
ingly similar  to  those  of  the  apostle  Paul;  but 
Bishop  Lightfoot,  who  regarded  the  Academy  of 


Il6    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Plato  as  a  vestibule  to  the  Church  of  Christ,  has 
shown  that  the  basis  of  the  Stoic  theology  is  a 
gross  materialism,  relieved  sometimes  by  a  vague 
mysticism,  and  thus  does  not  come  into  the  same 
theistic  category  with  the  Pauline  teaching. 
When  the  Christian  messenger  goes  to-day  to 
Arabia  or  to  China,  to  the  islands  of  Japan  or 
to  the  schools  of  India,  he  believes,  with  what 
seems  to  him  the  best  of  reasons,  that  he  has  a 
completer,  higher  and  more  potent  disclosure  of 
the  supreme  and  infinite  Spirit  than  has  been 
recorded  in  any  sacred  book  of  the  Orient. 

It  appears  to  us  that  it  is  a  terrible  experience 
to  live  without  faith  in  the  one  God.  It  stirs 
the  most  earnest  missionary  spirit  to  enter  by 
sympathy  into  the  consciousness  of  those  multi- 
tudes in  the  great  Eastern  world  who  have  not 
yet  fully  learned  the  monotheism  of  science  or 
the  monotheism  of  religion.  A  student  of 
Asiatic  thought  has  said:  "Faith  in  the  unity 
of  law  is  the  foundation  of  all  science,  but  the 
average  Asiatic  has  not  this  thought  or  faith. 
Appalled  at  his  own  insignificance,  amid  the  sub- 
lime mysteries  and  awful  immensities  of  nature, 
the  shadows  of  his  own  mind  become  to  him  real 
existences."'  "Just  so  far  as  Christianity  has 
accustomed  the  world  to  its  radical  doctrine  of  a 
changeless  and  omnipotent  God,  it  has  given  to 
science  an  undecaying  basis  and  impulse." 
Students   of  Japan   have  seen  what   a  poisonous 

'  Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  i. 


CHRISTIAN    THEISM.  117 

and  corrupting  element  in  Japanese  life  has  been 
the  rude  pantheism  which  branches  out  into 
polytheism  and  idolatry.  The  scientific  educa- 
tion which  that  wonderful  people  has  welcomed 
has  done  much  to  "remove  the  incubus,  to  re- 
place and  refill  the  mind,"  but  "for  the  cultured, 
whose  minds  waver  and  whose  feet  flounder,  as 
well  as  for  the  unlearned  and  priest-ridden,  there 
is  no  surer  help  and  healing  than  that  faith  in 
the  Heavenly  Father  which  gives  the  unifying 
thought  to  him  who  looks  through  creation." 

Now  Christianity,  we  believe,  has  a  perfect 
theism  with  which  to  emancipate  the  bewildered 
intellect,  and  more  than  this  it  has  a  loving  God 
with  Whom  to  satisfy  the  restless  and  sin-bur- 
dened heart.  Doubtless  the  doctrine  of  the 
divine  unity  is  not  the  exclusive  possession  nor 
the  original  discovery  of  Christian  teachers. 
Rude  sorts  of  monotheism  are  discoverable  in 
the  ancient  faiths  of  Japan  and  China.  The 
testimony  to  the  existence  of  a  vague  primeval 
•monotheism,  Egyptian,  Vedic,  Zoroastrian, 
Chinese,  Mexican,  is  neither  slight  nor  weak.^ 
There  is  certainly  a  very  ancient  Hellenic  be- 
lief in  the  unknown  God  whom  Paul  unveiled  at 
Athens,  the  God  "whose  foot-prints  have  been 
found  on  the  shifting  sands  of  remote  history." 
The  early  poetry  of  Greece  is  not  lacking  in 
glimpses  of  a  supreme  spiritual  Zeus  "before  the 
ideal  had  been  degraded  by  the  myth-making 
-Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  2. 


ll8    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

fancy."  In  the  Varuna  of  the  Hindu  hymns  we 
have  what  has  been  termed  the  earhest  picture 
of  the  unknown  God.  But,  how  different  is  the 
occasional,  unstable  monotheism  which  in  later 
Hinduism  becomes  pantheistic  and  polytheistic 
from  that  proclaimed  to  Israel,  "The  Lord  our 
God  is  one  Lord."  Christian  theism,  wherein 
the  divine  unity  is  warmed  by  an  indwelling 
Fatherhood,  is  in  vivid  contrast  with  the  cold 
and  stern  Deity  of  the  Greek  philosophers,  too 
cold  and  stern  to  be  the  God  of  the  multitudes, 
and  lacking  the  highest  ethical  elements  "even 
unselfish  love  and  child-like  purity."  Zeus,  the 
father  of  the  Greek  gods,  is  far  from  being  the 
loving  Father  of  all  men.  The  philosopher  Lotze 
deemed  the  God-consciousness  of  the  classical 
world  as  a  rivulet  matched  with  a  rushing  river 
by  the  side  of  the  God-consciousness  of  the  He- 
brew; and  when  we  reflect  that  Jesus  purified 
and  perfected  even  the  best  knowledge  of  God 
which  came  to  the  prophets,  we  recall  the  obser- 
vation of  Pascal,  that  "Christianity  is  so  divine 
that  another  divine  religion  M^as  only  its  founda- 
tion." "The  Old  Testament  knew  God  as  the 
Father  of  a  nation :  Christ  knew  Him  as  the 
Father  of  the  individual  soul." 

Still  we  make  a  mistake  to  underrate  that 
knowledge  of  the  Divine  Nature  which  the  whole 
providential  training  of  Israel  was  designed  to 
give.  The  stirring  and  eventful  history  which  is 
the  background  of   the  Old  Testament  revelation 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  I  19 

was  God's  school  for  the  chosen  people,  to  lift 
them  from  the  grossness  of  idolatrous  worship 
into  true  conceptions  of  Himself  and  especially 
of  His  unity  and  spirituality.  God  meant  some- 
thing great  and  wonderful,  not  only  for  Israel, 
but  for  universal  humanity,  when  He  called 
Abraham,  and  from  him  raised  up  a  peculiar 
people;  when  He  brought  Israel  out  of  idola- 
trous Egypt;  when  He  led  them  forty  years 
through  Arabian  sands  that  they  might  forget 
the  fascinations  of  Egyptian  polytheism.  He 
meant  something  by  the  decree  that  every  male 
Jew  should  wear  between  his  eyes,  and  bind  upon 
his  hand,  and  write  upon  the  posts  of  his  house 
and  the  gates  of  his  city,  the  sublime  declara- 
tion, "The  Lord  our  God  is  one  Lord."  Deep 
down  beneath  the  seven-fold  ruins  of  Jerusalem 
lie  to-day  the  foundations  of  that  temple  in 
which  was  no  graven  image  or  painted  Deity 
such  as  Egypt  and  Athens  adored,  but  in  whose 
holiest  sanctuary,  void  of  light  and  empty  of 
human  contrivance,  the  High  Priest  communed 
with  the  one  invisible  Jehovah.  Providence 
never  took  so  much  pains  to  teach  any  other 
lesson  as  that  of  the  divine  unity;  the  schooling 
lasted  two  thousand  years,  from  the  call  of 
Abraham  to  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem.  When 
the  house  of  Jacob  deserted  the  God  of  Bethel, 
He  brought  down  upon  it  the  flails  of  Egypt  and 
Babylon.  From  the  Nile  and  the  Euphrates 
He  summoned    His   ministers  of  correction,  and 


I20    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

frightened  eyes  saw  the  vales  about  Jerusalem 
which  had  been  polluted  with  heathen  altars, 
bright  with  the  scarlet  shields  of  Assyrian  horse- 
men. The  Holy  City  was  laid  in  heaps,  and  in 
long  captivity  Israel  relearned  the  lesson  which 
Abraham  and  Moses  and  David  and  Jeremiah 
had  taught,  which  Jesus  reaffirmed  in  Judea, 
and  Paul  reproclaimed  in  the  commercial  and 
intellectual  capitals  of  Greece. 

All  the  natural  attributes  which  belong  to  a 
true  conception  of  the  Deity  have  found  in  the 
Old  Testament  their  grandest  expression ;  and 
the  higher  elements  of  the  divine  nature,  His 
righteousness  and  mercy,  burn  like  a  line  of  fire 
through  the  Hebrew  Scriptures.  And  many  of 
the  highest  conceptions  of  the  supreme  splendor 
of  the  Divine  Personality  and  righteousness  have 
grown  up  under  the  fervent  teachings  of  law- 
giver and  psalmist  and  prophet.  The  ancient 
Scriptures  employed  all  earthly  types  and  rela- 
tionships to  actualize  and  illuminate  our  concep- 
tions of  Him  in  whose  mind  all  earthly  phenom- 
ena lay  as  ideas  before  the  world  came  into 
being.  According  to  Biblical  theism  God  is  a 
person,  and  not  Matthew  Arnold's  "stream  of 
tendency."  Doubtless  personality  in  God  does 
not  denote  being  with  the  limitations  of  human 
personality,  but  for  popular  speech  any  other 
representation  is  excluded.  "God  cannot  be 
thought  of  as  a  personality  by  the  side  of  others, 
but    as   the   personality  embracing  all  other  per- 


CHR/STIAX   THEISM.  121 

sonalities  in  conscious  freedom."  And  we  do 
not  spiritualize  our  conception  of  Him  by  think- 
ing of  the  God-head  as  a  vague  something 
diffused  through  the  universe,  reaching  on 
through  immensity,  not  altogether  here  nor  alto- 
gether there,  but  pervading  all  things  like  a  sub- 
tle ether.  If  this  be  true,  then  only  an  infinitesi- 
mal part  of  God  can  be  in  one  place  at  a  time. 
God  is  divided  if  partly  here  and  partly  a  thou- 
sand miles  away.  But  spirit  cannot  be  divided. 
It  is  the  Biblical  representation  that  God  is 
wholly  present  everywhere.  God  is  immanent, 
in  Nature,  as  well  as  transcendent,  above  Nature. 
To  the  Christian  theist,  as  to  the  Hindu  pan- 
theist, the  world  is  transfused  with  God  like  a 
globe  of  crystal  in  which  the  light  dwells.  The 
universe,  as  one  has  said,  "is  a  handful  of  dust 
which  God  enchants  "  —  a  thought  which  has  in- 
spired all  the  greater  poets.  Martineau  has 
written  that  "beneath  the  dome  of  this  universe 
we  cannot  stand  where  the  musings  of  the  eter- 
nal mind  do  not  murmur  round  us  and  the  vis- 
ions of  His  loving  thought  appear."  "Nature," 
as  Emerson  says,  "is  too  thin  a  veil,  for  God  is 
all  the  while  breaking  through."  Human  life 
and  all  life  are  too  w^onderful  for  us  to  keep 
out  of  them  God,  "the  mysterious  magic  that 
possesses  the  world."  Our  modern  studies  have 
shown  us  the  omnipresence  of  thought  and 
adaptation  in  the  universe,  so  that  we  look  upon 
the  earth    as   having  apparently  been  made  to  be 


122     C1IRISTIANIT7',  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

a  school-room,  a  work-shop,  a  home,  a  temple 
for  man.  We  look  upon  the  universe  and  find 
intelligent  order  everywhere  apparent.  We  per- 
ceive that  the  idea  of  each  created  thing  must  have 
existed  before  the  thing  itself  came  into  being,  as 
it  did  in  all  probability  through  that  process  which 
we  call  evolution,  a  doctrine  which,  as  Professor 
Drummond  has  well  said,  "has  not  affected  except 
to  improve  and  confirm  it,  the  old  teaching  that 
all  things  have  been  created  on  a  plan."  The 
presence  of  mind  is  manifest  in  the  numberless 
adaptations  everywhere  discoverable,  and  the 
deeper  we  go  in  order  to  inspect  the  beginnings 
of  life,  the  more  startling  are  the  disclosures  of 
divine  activity  and  intelligence.  God  is  evi- 
dently directing  the  movement  and  development 
of  the  original  cells  out  of  which  spring  oaks, 
oxen,  olive  trees,  the  rose,  the  lion,  the  vulture, 
and  all  the  marvels  of  organized  existence,  weav- 
ing the  various  tissues  of  this  living  tapestry. 
An  everywhere-present  God  is  essential  to  the 
carrying  on  of  universal  life,  spanning  the  clouds 
with  rainbows,  painting  a  thousand  landscapes 
on  the  wings  of  butterflies,  marshaling  the  hosts 
of  the  suns,  directing  the  infinite  armies  of  the 
atoms.  The  universe  is  one  blazing  wheel 
within  other  blazing  wheels,  all  rushing  with  in- 
conceivable rapidity  and  testifying  by  the  omni- 
presence of  motion  to  the  omnipresence  of 
that  Mind  that  created  and  upholds  all  things, 
and   without   whose  continued   activity  the  very 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  123 

thought  of  universal  motion  is  inconceivable  and 
inconceivably  absurd. 

Modern  Science,  the  handmaid  and  helper  of 
Christian  Theism,  presents  also  to  our  attention 
the  fact  of  the  universality  of  law,  the  want  of 
caprice  in  the  motions  of  the  universe,  the  un- 
deviating  submission  of  all  things  to  intelligent 
regulation,  so  that  the  winds  do  not  blow  with- 
out method  nor  the  waves  roll  disobedient  to 
the  divine  mathematics.  But  law  is  inconceiva- 
ble except  as  the  working  of  a  willing  mind. 
Self-made  or  self-executed  it  is  an  absurdity,  as 
much  so  as  a  proposition  made  to  an  organ  that 
it  should  compose  and  render  the  Hallelujah 
Chorus  or  any  other  great  piece  of  music;  so 
that  when  we  have  extended  the  domain  of  law 
so  as  to  embrace  the  rushing  and  shining  host 
of  the  stars,  and  when  we  have  found  law  every- 
where executed,  we  have  only  announced  the 
omnipresence  of  Him  who  said  to  Jeremiah, 
"Am  I  a  God  at  hand,  and  not  a  God  afar  off? 
Do  I  not  fill  heaven  and  earth?" 

And  furthermore,  wide  and  careful  observation 
brings  before  us  the  omnipresence  of  conscience, 
the  solemn  fact  that  the  moral  law  cannot  be 
escaped ;  that  though  we  may  put  oceans  be- 
tween us  and  courts  of  justice,  infinite  space  can- 
not separate  us  from  conscience.  Neither 
heaven  nor  hell  nor  the  uttermost  part  of  the 
sea  is  beyond  the  immediate  action  of  the  moral 
law.      There  are  great   distinctions,  such  as  right 


124     CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  wrong,  expressed  in  all  languages,  perceivable 
in  all  nations.  Men  everywhere  are  under  obli- 
gation to  choose  what  is  good  and  to  shun  what 
is  evil,  and  they  have  felt  that  in  their  moral 
choices  they  have  had  the  approval  or  disapproval 
of  some  one  above  themselves.  What  is  the  ex- 
planation of  these  facts  and  convictions?  If  you 
ask  History,  she  answers,  God.  Pointing  to  the 
smoke  of  countless  sacrifices  and  to  unnumbered 
temples  of  worship,  she  declares  that  men  have 
deemed  themselves  accountable  to  a  Supreme 
Being  whose  approval  they  desired,  whose  disap- 
proval they  feared.  The  moral  law  written  on 
the  human  heart  is  one  of  the  sources  and  occa- 
sions of  all  religion.  If  you  ask  Philosophy  what 
it  means,  she  repeats  her  sublime  axiom,  that 
every  effect  must  have  an  adequate  cause.  The 
moral  law  is  a  stupendous  effect,  and  only  the 
rudest  materialism  denies  that  it  points,  together 
with  all  lower  effects,  to  a  Great  First  Cause, 
for  whose  existence,  as  Herbert  Spencer  affirms, 
"we  have  a  greater  degree  of  evidence  than  for 
any  other  truth  whatsoever."  If  you  make  your 
appeal  to  the  moral  sense  itself  when  touched  by 
the  feeling  of  guilt,  you  find  an  answer  in  the 
penitential  psalms  of  all  religions,  or  in  the  words 
of  remorseful  David,  "Against  Thee  and  Thee 
only  have  I  sinned."  It  is  sometimes  said  that 
God  is  in  the  world,  but  it  is  truer  to  say  that 
the  world  is  in  God,  for  in  Him  we  and  all 
things   move   and   have   our  being,  and  thus  the 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  1 25 

universe  becomes  what  Sir  Isaac  Newton  called 
it,  "the  vast  sensorium  of  Deity,"  with  God 
vital  and  throbbing  in  every  part  of  it. 

The  enlightened  Christian  has  no  need  to  seek 
refuge  in  pantheism  to  find  the  teaching  which 
brings  God  home  to  his  daily  thought  and  life. 
The  immense  and  continued  fascination  of  pan- 
theistic systems  has  been  vividly  apparent  in 
India.  When  Gautama  Buddha  rejected  the 
doctrine  of  God  or  gods,  and  substituted  law  in 
their  stead,  when  he  emptied  the  Hindu  pan- 
theon of  its  divine  intelligences,  he  sounded  the 
death-knell  of  Buddhism  for  the  land  of  its  birth. 
It  has  been  said  that  Brahmanism  has  never  for- 
given Buddhism  for  ignoring  the  gods,  and  the 
Hindus  finally  drove  its  followers  out  of  India. 
The  one  doctrine  which  the  philosophic  Hindu 
of  to-day  defends,  and  in  which  he  finds  his 
strength  and  his  consolation,  is  his  doctrine  of 
God.  The  best  truth  that  can  be  found  in  pan- 
theism, namely,  the  Divine  immanence,  is  found 
in  the  Christian  idea  of  God,  coupled  with  the 
best  truth  that  can  be  found  in  Jewish  monothe- 
ism, God's  personality  and  control  over  nature.^ 
To  the  Christian  theist  the  Hindu  pantheism 
with  all  its  fascinations  is  a  golden  fog,  blotting 
out  many  a  star  of  truth  and  hope,  because  the 
divine  personality  is  obliterated  or  obscured. 
Judaism  intensified  the  thought  of  God's  indi- 
viduality. His  separateness  from  nature,  which  is 

■'Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  3. 


126    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

yet  His  living  garment,  as  Goethe  says,  and 
there  is  lasting  truth  and  comfort  in  its  manifold 
representations  of  God  as  Father,  Mother,  Hus- 
band, King,  Fortress,  Sun,  Shield,  Rock,  and 
Star. 

But  ancient  historic  Judaism  failed  to  teach  a 
perfect  theism.  The  Jew  made  the  mistake  of 
believing  that,  as  God's  worship  had  been  local- 
ized and  restricted  it  must  always  remain  so. 
God  had  been  localized  on  Mount  Sinai,  where 
the  law  was  given ;  in  the  pillars  of  cloud  and 
fire,  the  symbols  of  His  guidance  and  glory;  in 
the  tabernacle  and  the  temple,  at  Shiloh  and 
Jerusalem.  God  had  had  a  special  people  with 
a  special  worship  and  a  peculiar  revelation  of 
Himself.  And  the  Jew  did  not  understand  that 
when  Jesus  appeared,  the  hour  had  come  for  a 
wider  disclosure,  when  the  true  worshipers  were 
to  worship  Him.  in  spirit  and  in  truth.  Judea 
had  been  the  cradle  of  the  highest  spiritual 
knowledge,  but  Christ  came  to  send  it  forth  as  a 
strong  man  armed  to  all  nations.  Back  of  this 
localization  of  Deity,  back  of  all  these  visible 
manifestations,  was  the  Infinite  One  whom  the 
heaven  of  heavens  cannot  contain,  whose  chil- 
dren were  to  be  the  spiritual  followers  of  that 
Abraham  w^ho  believed  God  and  was  accepted  of 
Him,  before  one  altar  had  been  piled  at  Shechem 
or  Bethel,  and  when  Canaan  was  no  more  sacred 
than  the  unpierced  wilds  of  America.  To  this 
higher    truth    Israel   was   blind;    to   this    higher 


CHRISTIAN    THEISM.  127 

truth  the  Christian  world  has  sometimes  been 
bhnd,  having  fallen  from  the  height  of  the  Mas- 
ter's teachings.  But  if  the  early  proclamation 
of  the  Gospel  meant  anything  in  the  realm  of 
Theism,  it  meant  the  bringing  home  to  men's 
hearts  the  spiritual  truths  and  forces  which  came 
from  the  teaching,  the  person,  and  the  work  of 
Christ.  It  meant  the  truth  that  God  is  love, 
that  God  is  light,  that  God  is  spirit.  Christianity 
in  its  purity  has  held  the  human  heart  and  mind 
to  the  great  truths  which  make  spiritual  worship 
possible,  and  which  make  idolatry  a  degradation 
of  man's  nobler  self. 

The  Christian  theist  has  learned  the  secret  of 
worship.  He  has  learned  that  he  himself  is 
spirit ;  that  the  soul  which  works  through  the 
hands  and  looks  through  the  eyes,  which  thinks, 
and  loves,  and  wills,  which  has  a  mysterious 
relation  to  the  brain,  is  distinct  from  its  bodily 
servants.  The  human  spirit  refuses  to  submit  to 
the  measuring-line  and  the  microscope  and  to 
the  tests  of  the  chemist  and  the  mathematician. 
Man  is  spirit,  and  may  discern  and  worship  God. 
God  is  spirit,  hidden  to  the  eye,  inaudible,  in- 
tangible. He  is  love,  which  has  a  thousand 
manifestations,  shining  in  the  dew  and  glowing 
in  the  heavens,  resplendent  in  household  affec- 
tions, dazzling  at  the  Cross,  but  itself  only  dis- 
cerned by  that  love  in  man  which  is  also  invisible 
to  the  eye.  God  is  righteousness,  evidenced  in 
the  crumbling   of  an   empire,  and  in  the  sting  of 


I2«    CIIRISTIANITT,   THE   WOnLD-RELK.ION. 

a  child's  remorse,  but  revealed  only  to  that  con- 
science which  no  crucible  can  analyze  —  to  that 
spiritual  substance  in  man  which  is  as  much  more 
ethereal  and  sensitive  than  light  as  the  rustle  of 
the  star-beam  is  more  delicate  than  the  roar  of 
Niagara.  God  is  wisdom,  shown  forth  in  the 
changing  seasons,  in  the  cleansing  rainstorm, 
manifest  in  Providence  and  in  supernatural  reve- 
lation, but  thus  shown  forth  only  to  that  reason 
in  man  which  sends  its  invisible  thoughts  from 
star  to  star  and  binds  with  invisible  cords  the 
footstool  and  the  throne  of  God.  God  is  spirit, 
and  His  worshipers  must  adore  Him  through  the 
mind  and  by  the  medium  of  truth.  He  dwell- 
eth  not  in  temples  made  with  hands,  as  Paul 
said  to  the  bewildered  people  of  Athens;  neither 
is  He  worshiped  with  men's  hands,  as  we  are 
endeavoring  to  persuade  the  bewildered  people 
of  Asia.  It  is  only  by  the  activity  of  those 
faculties  which  take  hold  of  God,  it  is  only  by 
an  individual  appropriation  of  the  truth  through 
the  ministry  of  the  Divine  Spirit,  that  the  human 
soul  is  purified,  and  thus  fitted  for  true  worship. 
Christianity  goes  to  the  nations  to-day,  and 
begins  the  uplift  and  regeneration  of  the  spirit 
by  teaching  that  God's  true  temple  is  in  the 
hearts  of  men.  Their  souls  must  be  made  holy, 
for  God  is  a  God  of  perfect  righteousness,  of  un- 
spotted holiness.  Christianity  taught  the  an- 
cient Greek,  and  would  teach  the  modern  Hindu, 
to    be    ashamed    of   deities  who   are  not  adorned 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  129 

with  ordinary  human  virtues.  Did  not  Lord 
Bacon  instruct  us  that  it  is  better  to  have  no 
conception  of  God  than  one  that  is  unworthy  of 
Him?  HoHness  is  God's  diadem,  the  crown  of 
His  perfection,  without  which  power  and  wisdom 
and  love  itself  lose  their  highest  glory.  The 
Christian  messenger  instructs  men  that  the  God 
who  now  commandeth  all  to  repent  has  never 
committed  the  slightest  wrong,  that  all  His  ways 
are  righteous,  that  all  His  acts  are  perfect,  and 
that  if  any  vice  existed  in  the  character  of  God, 
the  worshiping  universe  must  be  dumb.  Seraphs 
would  veil  their  faces,  not  in  adoration  but  in 
shame,  and  the  multitudinous  symphonies  of 
Heaven  would  die  out  in  a  dismal  and  discordant 
wail,  and  the  pure-shining  stars,  musical  with 
praise,  must  cease  their  spheral  chimes  and  hide 
their  holy  splendors,  for  the  light  had  forsaken 
the  brow  of  Jehovah,  and  all  His  realms  were 
darkened  to  their  utmost  bound. 

The  Christian  goes  to  men  with  the  teaching 
that  since  God  is  holy,  the  way  of  life  is  the  way 
of  holiness.  While  Christianity  is  a  spiritualism 
that  does  not  despise  Nature  and  a  monotheism 
which  does  not  separate  God  from  His  world,  it 
is  also  a  morality  which  neither  divorces  the 
inner  from  the  outer  life  nor  breaks  "the 
organic  bond  between  the  individual  and  so- 
ciety." As  the  God  whom  Christianity  discloses 
is  ethical.  He  is  honored  by  an  ethical  life,  which 
includes  a  fraternal  spirit   toward  men  and  a  filial 


130    CIIRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

spirit  toward  God.  "All  ethical  conduct  is 
grounded  in  religion,  and  all  religious  conduct  is 
determined  ethically."  The  Power  not  ourselves 
that  makes  for  righteousness  is  intensely  con- 
cerned in  regard  to  the  interior  dispositions  of 
men.  He  dwells  only  in  the  hearts  of  the  pure, 
the  merciful,  the  meek,  the  righteous,  and  the 
loving,  and  the  lowliest  savage  of  the  African 
forest,  the  humblest  pariah  of  the  Hindu  jungle, 
may  construct  for  God  a  temple  more  acceptable 
to  Him  than  any  miracle  of  beauty  that  ever 
topped  the  hills  of  Attica  or  is  to-day  embow- 
ered in  ilex  trees  beneath  the  snowy  cone  of 
Fujijama.  It  has  been  the  aspiration  of  peoples 
and  the  ambition  of  kings  to  embody  their 
thought  of  the  Supreme  One  in  enduring  and 
costly  stone.  Through  the  centuries  has  breathed 
the  spirit  that 

"  Roofed  Karnak's  hall  of  gods,  and  laid 
The  plinth  of  Philae's  colonnade." 

We  bow  before  the  religious  genius  that  raised 
the  many-pillared  fanes  of  antiquity.  We  be- 
hold with  Avonder  how  the  vigorous  faith  of  the 
Middle  Ages  blossomed  out  in  the  Christian 
cathedral.  Piety  has  yearned  for  an  earthly 
habitation.  Beneath  the  dome  of  St.  Peter's 
Church  in  Rome  you  feel  the  uplifting  joy  of 
being  where  it  seems  worthy  that  God  should 
dwell.  You  enter  the  great  vestibule  and  push 
aside  the  heavy  curtain  and  slowly  absorb  the 
suggestiveness     of      a    scene     which     sometimes 


CHRIST/ AN    THEISM.  131 

dwarfs  and  dims  the  spaciousness  and  splendor 
of  the  outer  universe.  You  walk  the  conse- 
crated pavements  where  armies  might  move  with 
freedom.  There  is  no  oppressiveness  in  this 
grandeur,  no  gloom  in  this  solemnity.  The 
cheerful  light  falls  tenderly  through  the  ever 
balmy  air,  on  marble  and  mosaic,  on  bronze  and 
gold.  With  exultation  you  move  toward  the 
central  shrine  of  St.  Peter.  Everything  magni- 
fies as  you  approach.  The  pilasters  expand  into 
pillars,  which  seem  mighty  enough  to  uphold  the 
crystal  arches  of  the  heavens.  Slowly  the  ma- 
jestic dome  opens  to  your  vision,  a  sculptured 
and  emblazoned  poem,  lifting  the  aspiration  to 
sublimer  heights,  while  its  vastness  seems  lov- 
ingly to  enclose  and  shelter  your  greatest  thought 
of  God.  But  while  your  heart  is  thus  opened 
by  the  sensuous  imagination,  the  Divine  Spirit 
finds  His  home,  not  amid  those  luminous  spaces 
but  in  the  worshiper's  soul,  and  without  irrever- 
ence he  may  say,  with  Christ,  there  is  something 
here  "greater  than  the  temple."  Here  is  love 
which  interprets  love  and  renders  praises  which 
are  more  acceptable  than  the  adornments  of  the 
world's  cathedral.  The  architecture  of  man  is 
the  plaything  of  time.  The  sanctuaries  of 
human  pride  disappear.  The  road  from  Delhi 
to  the  Kutub  Minar  is  strewn  far  and  wide  with 
ruinous  domes  and  broken  columns,  the  traces 
of  three  religions.  On  Mount  Gerizim  the 
Samaritan    worships   at    a   broken    shrine.       The 


132    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

wild  stork  perches  on  the  columns  of  Ephesian 
temples.  It  is  the  whiteness  of  a  shattered 
beauty  which  the  Parthenon  now  lifts  into  the 
violet  ether  of  Athens.  And  the  time  will  come 
when  the  golden  lamps  about  St.  Peter's  tomb 
shall  be  extinguished,  and  the  miracle  of  Michael. 
Aneelo  shall  mingle  in  the  dust  of  ancient  Rome, 
but  the  architecture  of  God  abides.  "Ye  are 
the  temples  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  "Fairer  far 
than  aught  by  artist  feigned,  or  pious  ardor 
reared,"  are  the  holy  places  of  the  soul.  The 
Divine  One  has  tabernacled  in  humanity,  and 
made  it  sacred.  In  the  believer's  heart,  accord- 
ing to  the  New  Testament,  Christ  dwelleth,  the 
hope  of  glory. 

But  besides  this  unity  and  spirituality  there 
is  still  another  supreme  fact  in  the  Christian 
revelation  of  God  which  pre-eminently  makes  it 
fit  to  become  the  universal  faith  of  mankind. 
Christianity  alone  reveals  the  Divine  One  as  con- 
tinuously and  mercifully  seeking  after  mankind. 
It  shows  us  God  standing  by  the  side  of  fallen 
man  at  the  beginning,  with  gracious  purposes  that 
overtop  the  curse  and  outrun  the  consequences 
of  transgression.  It  shows  us  God  inaugurating 
a  system  of  redemption  and  recovery,  and  lifting 
above  the  red  flag  of  the  primeval  anarchy  the 
banner  of  His  love.  From  first  to  last  the 
Bible  is  the  call  of  God  to  His  earthly  children. 
The  Saviour  of  mankind  expressly  declared  that 
He   had    not    come  to  condemn  the  world.      He 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  1 33 

came  to  reveal  the  God  of  all  grace ;  and  a  most 
difficult  work  of  the  messenger  of  Christ,  whether 
in  Canton  or  Calcutta,  is  to  persuade  men,  who 
have  thought  of  God  as  remote  and  impersonal, 
that  He  loves  them  with  an  affection  overpassing 
their  utmost  imaginations.  When  we  get  any 
faintest  glimpse  of  the  Divine  Fatherhood  which 
is  the  background  of  Christ's  redeeming  work, 
and  try  to  measure  with  our  limited  vision  the 
immeasurable  pity  of  God,  a  compassion  which 
was  not  brought  into  being  when  the  angels  first 
choired  the  heavenly  songs  of  Bethlehem,  we 
learn,  often  slowly,  to  trust,  in  the  midst  of  all 
the  perplexities  and  griefs  of  life,  that  divine 
heart  whose  pulse-beats,  as  the  Christian  believer 
feels,  are  the  life  of  the  universe.  And  we  be- 
lieve and  strive  to  make  others  believe,  not  only 
as  Abraham  did,  that  the  Judge  of  all  the  earth 
will  do  right,  but  that  the  Father  "who  would 
rather  suffer  wrong  than  do  it,"  will  never  see 
one  slightest  shadow  of  injustice  darkening  the 
glory  of  His  great  white  throne.  The  Christian 
Bible  is  the  enfranchisement  of  hope;  it  is  the 
word  of  Him  who  came  to  destroy  the  works  of 
the  devil,  and  who  did  not  fail;  it  lifts  the  Cross, 
with  its  disclosure  of  the  bleeding  heart  of  in- 
finite pity,  above  the  troubled  life  of  humanity, 
and  fills  the  whole  sunset  horizon  of  our  faith 
with  the  jeweled  splendors  of  the  New  Jerusa- 
lem. It  is  the  gracious  and  helpful  attitude  of 
God    toward    human    sin    and    sorrow    which    it 


134    CHRIST  IAN  ITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

seems  to  us  that  men  the  world  over  need  to 
apprehend.  Among  the  ten  thousand  difficul- 
ties of  the  Christian  teacher  in  China  to-day,  not 
the  least  is  really  to  open  the  heart  of  the  people 
to  the  central  truth  of  redemption — God's  love  in 
Christ.  Preach  to  them  hell,  and  they  believe 
in  that  already,  and  they  have  gone  far  ahead  of 
Dante  in  making  it  horrible.  They  will  tell  you 
of  eighteen  tiers  of  hells,  a  hell  eighteen  thou- 
sand miles  in  circumference  and  a  thousand  miles 
high,  an  iron  city,  a  metropolis  of  direst  tor- 
tures, fire  falling  from  above  and  ascending  from 
below;  they  will  tell  you  of  caldrons  of  burn- 
ing oil  and  lakes  of  blood,  and  hills  of  knives, 
and  dungeons  of  bubbling  filth,  and  bridges  of 
snakes,  and  cylinders  of  eternal  fire.  But  the 
God  of  Calvary,  who  stretched  out  His  hands  to 
death  from  love  to  the  guilty,  and  who  carries 
the  heaven  of  grace  in  His  heart,  Him  they  are 
slow,  alas!  in  knowing;  the  God  Avho  is  full  of 
gentleness  and  patience  and  long-suffering;  the 
God  who  is  able  to  lift  the  Celestial  Empire  out 
of  its  spiritual  bondage  and  set  it  forward  on  the 
path  of  progress;  the  God  who  can  inform  with 
celestial  life  the  strong,  stolid  intellect  of  China; 
the  God  whose  love  floods  the  universe  with 
blessings,  and  who  holds  out  from  His  eternal 
throne  the  golden  scepter  of  mercy. 

The  classic  text  of  Christianity  in  its  world- 
embracing  efforts  is  that  verse  of  the  fourth  Gos- 
pel   which   begins,  "God    so   loved    the   world." 


CHRIST /AX    THE  ISM.  ^35 

The  illustrious  sage  of  China  did  not  say  that, 
and  to-day  we  are  informed  that  the  Christian 
preaching  of  love  to  God,  as  a  response  to  His 
love  toward  us,  sounds  outlandish  to  the  men  of 
Chinese  minds  in  the  Middle  Kingdom,  who  seem 
to  think  "that  it  can  only  come  from  the  lips  of 
those  who  have  not  been  properly  trained." 
Confucius  did  not  claim  to  know  much  of  the 
power  that  rules  in  the  heavens.  Prince  Sid- 
dartha,  driven  into  practical  atheism,  never 
uttered  any  message  of  divine  love,  and  so  the 
Gospel  of  Buddha,  which  modern  scholars  are 
compiling  and  printing,  seems  to  Christians  a  mis- 
nomer. Such  is  man's  need  of  worship  that  the 
agnosticism  with  which  Buddha  began  was  not 
forever  continued  with  all  his  disciples.  "The 
preacher  of  atheism  became  himself  a  god." 
Friendly  students  of  the  prophet  of  Islam  have 
sometimes  afifirmed  that  Mohammed's  God  is 
savage,  aggressive,  almost  cruel.  The  Koran 
speaks  much  of  the  Merciful  One,  but  that  mercy 
is  dimmed  by  other  attributes,  and  is  not  made 
real  and  credible;  Islam  is  truly  the  crescent,  a 
pale,  lunar  sickle  of  gracious  truth  in  the  sky  of 
religion.  I  know  that  we  may  discern  the  lumi- 
nous shadow  faintly  rounded  out,  but  the  light  is 
narrow  and  not  intense.  Allah  is  a  God  afar  ofT. 
He  does  not  satisfy  the  yearnings  of  the  soul, 
and  as  Kuenen  has  said,  "The  people,  therefore, 
make  a  new  religion  at  the  graves  of  its  saints; 
it  seeks   compensation    for   the    dryness  of   the 


136    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

official  doctrine  and  worship  ;  true  universalism  is 
to  Islam  in  virtue  of  its  very  origin,  unattainable. 

As  to  Hinduism/  while  it  has  shown  for  more 
than  two  thousand  years  man  seeking,  by  devious 
ways  and  through  golden  mists  or  deadly  vapors, 
the  face  of  God,  it  seems,  until  modified  by 
Christianity,  to  have  known  little,  although  it  is 
rich  in  fabulous  incarnations,  of  the  Supreme 
Love  actually  in  some  historic  manifestation 
seeking  fallen  man  with  divine  pity  and  the  pur- 
pose of  complete  redemption.  Other  faiths,  as 
I  have  intimated,  may  appropriate  to-day  the 
Christian  idea  and  revelation  of  God's  universal 
Fatherhood,  finding  expression  in  acts  of  mercy, 
but  we  must  not  forget  that  what  is  giving  this 
great  truth  its  general  acceptance  is  the  teaching 
and  work  of  Christ.  There  is  something  rather 
odd  in  the  methods  of  some  Indian  reformers 
who,  as  one  of  your  able  journals  has  written, 
"appropriate  the  doctrines  and  motives  of  Chris- 
tianity and  fling  them  in  triumph  at  Christians." 
How  Jesus  toiled  to  inspire  in  men  who  were 
out  of  the  way  the  confidence  that  He  is  the 
God-ordained  Saviour  of  mankind!  For  this  He 
strewed  His  journeys  with  beneficent  miracles 
which  drew  the  attention  of  the  stupidest;  for 
this  He  showed  the  tenderest  regard  for  the 
most  afifiicted  and  despised;  for  this  He  touched 
the  whitened  skin  of  the  leper  and  sat  at  meat 
with  publicans  and    permitted    the   loving  atten- 

•■  Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  4. 


CHRISTIAN    THEISM.  137 

tions  of  outcast  women.  For  this  He  denied 
Himself,  in  one  long  series  of  sacrifices,  from  the 
shadowing  of  His  divine  glory  in  the  darkened 
stable  of  Bethlehem  to  the  culmination  of  the 
divine  tragedy  beneath  the  murky  skies  of  Gol- 
gotha. What  is  there  within  the  omnipotence 
of  Deity  which  He  did  not  do  to  show  that  sin 
is  not  beyond  the  reach  of  God's  victorious  de- 
livering mercy?  He  fastened  men's  minds  on 
Himself,  that  they  might  know  God's  radical 
dispositions.  His  unspeakable  and  infinite  com- 
passions, so  that  seeing  Jesus  as  He  beheld  with 
all-pitying  eyes  the  shepherdless  multitudes  of 
Galilee,  we  get  a  glimpse  of  the  heart  of  God's 
love,  that  glows  over  all  His  numberless  stray- 
ing children  in  all  lands,  from  Arctic  ice  to 
equatorial  palms,  and  down  all  the  sorrowing 
ages,  and  that,  with  a  fullness  of  fire  compared 
with  which  the  sun  himself  is  an  enfeebled  and 
half-smothered  flame,  burns  along  the  horizon  or 
high  up  in  the  zenith  of  our  daily  life. 

I  hope  that  by  what  has  been  thus  far  said  I 
have  given  no  impression  that  outside  of  Chris- 
tianity the  Divine  Spirit  has  been  comparatively 
inactive.  God,  I  find  in  all  the  great  religions 
and  higher  philosophies,  not  only  in  the  modern 
sage  who  said,  "O  God  I  think  thy  thoughts 
after  thee,"  but  in  the  songs  of  the  ancient 
Vedas  where  it  was  written  of  God  that  "through 
Him  the  sky  is  bright  and  the  earth  firm,  the 
heaven  was  established,  nay  the  highest  heaven, 


138    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  who  measured  out  light  in  the  air."  He  is 
present  in  the  life  of  all  His  creatures.  As 
Phillips  Brooks  once  said,  "Everywhere  through- 
out the  world  God  has  made  Himself  known  to 
His  children;  He  is  making  Himself  known  to 
His  children  to-day."  Paul  did  not  underrate 
or  despise  the  spiritual  knowledge  which  his 
Greek  and  Roman  hearers  already  possessed ;  he 
frankly  confessed  the  glimpses  of  truth  discov- 
erable in  their  systems,  and  while  he  presented 
the  most  scathing  arraignment  of  Roman  vices 
to  be  found  in  literature,  yet  with  his  discrimi- 
nating love  and  intelligence  he  perceived  and 
felt  how  much  of  truth  God  has  given  to  all 
men's  consciences  and  understandings.  The 
youthful  Buddha  felt  and  said,  "There  must  be 
some  supreme  intelligence  where  we  could  find 
rest;  if  I  attained  it,  I  could  bring  light  to  man; 
if  I  were  free  myself,  I  could  deliver  the  world." 
Why  may  this  not  have  been  the  working  of  the 
Spirit  of  God,  and  prophetic,  like  so  much  which 
we  find  in  Greek,  Persian,  and  Hindu  thought  and 
hope  of  Him  who  was  free,  and  who  through 
the  disclosure  of  God's  mercy  has  brought  de- 
liverance to  the  world?  Foreshadowings  of  the 
great  facts  of  incarnation  and  atonement  appear 
in  the  sacred  books  of  the  nations.  Many  have 
regarded  certain  strange  sentences  in  the  Vedic 
hymns  and  in  the  laws  of  Manu  as  being  "traces 
of  the  revelation  once  made  to  mankind  of  the 
promised  atonement  for  the  sins  of  the  world." 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  1 39 

But  how  fragmentary  and  feeble  are  the  best 
representations  of  the  God  of  all  mercy  to  be 
found  in  other  literature  compared  with  the 
mighty  and  full-orbed  truths  of  the  Christian 
Scriptures!  The  supreme  disclosure  of  the  divine 
nature  as  redeeming  love  is  seen  in  the  Incarna- 
tion of  the  Son  of  God.  This  is  the  climax  of 
all  disclosures.  The  Christian  doctrine  of  God 
in  Christ  is  not  merely  that  a  human  being  at- 
tained the  loftiest  height  of  spiritual  knowledge 
and  remained  there  through  life  in  the  holy  of 
holies  of  religion.  The  Christian  teaching  is 
that  God's  personality,  God  Himself,  took  pos- 
session of  the  temple  of  the  human  spirit,  so  that 
Jesus  could  say  "I  and  my  Father  are  one," 
and  so  that  "Jesus  has  for  us  the  religious  value 
of  God."  This  Christian  teaching  remains  un- 
shaken. No  other  faith  in  history  "has  been  so 
continuous  and  invariable."  And  the  inspiration 
of  the  Church's  activities  to-day,  like  the  foun- 
dation of  the  Church's  hope  in  the  beginning, 
has  been  this  faith  that  He  who  was  equal  with 
God  voluntarily  withdrew  Himself  from  the  un- 
speakable fellowships  of  the  Godhead  and  took 
a  human  form  and  a  human  nature  for  our  salva- 
tion. The  faith  of  the  Church  has  involved  the 
unity  of  Christ  with  God  and  the  unity  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  Christ's  personal  representative  in 
the  world,  with  God.  "All  the  higher  philoso- 
phies have  held  to  a  possible  Trinity."  The 
doctrine   of   the   Trinity  was   simply  an  attempt, 


140    CHRISriANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION, 

as  one  has  said,  "to  give  richness,  variety,  in- 
ternal relations,  abundance,  and  freedom  to  our 
ideas  of  God."  "Christianity  gives  us  a  con- 
ception of  a  Godhead  which  has  all  the  constitu- 
ents and  conditions  of  real  intellectual,  moral, 
and  social  existence,"  thus  saving  us  from  "the 
deism  which  shuts  up  God  within  the  limitations 
or  impotences  of  His  own  infinitude,  and  from  the 
pantheism  which  loses  Him  within  the  multi- 
tudinous and  fleeting  phenomena  of  an  ever- 
changing  universe."  But  the  working  force  of 
Christianity  has  not  been  the  Trinity,  but  the 
Incarnation  of  the  Son  of  God  for  the  redemp- 
tion of  man.^  This  revelation  of  God  in  Christ 
making  atonement  for  sin  is  a  force  of  truth  and 
of  life,  and  a  message  of  historic  fact  by  which 
the  Christian  Church  has  actually  delivered  men 
from  the  power  and  defilement  of  sin,  and  by 
which  the  Church  purposes  to  redeem  the  world 
from  the  guilt  and  love  of  sin. 

I  look  around  the  world  to-day  and  find  no 
other  religions  which  seriously  attempt  the  work 
of  redemption — "they  have  no  healing  for  the 
sin-stricken  soul."  Christianity  makes  much  of 
sin,  because  the  vivid  consciousness  of  sin  leads 
to  a  higher  sense  of  personal  responsibility  and 
to  a  closer  union  with  God.  The  pantheism 
which  identifies  man  with  his  Creator,  making 
the  Divine  Being  the  ultimate  cause  of  all  evil, 
weakens  this  and   almost  eradicates  the  sense  of 

^Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  5. 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  1 41 

the  personal  element.*'  "Pantheism  can  never 
do  justice  to  the  unlimited  value  of  moral  toil." 

We  are  not  surprised  that  Spinoza  looked 
upon  human  freedom  as  a  dream,  and  rubbed  ofT 
the  sharp  distinction  between  good  and  bad. 
Nor  are  we  surprised  that  Strauss,  when  he  went 
over  into  the  ranks  of  materialism,  thought  the 
hope  of  individual  immortality  a  delusion. 
While  Christianity  presents  in  a  holy,  personal, 
omnipresent,  merciful  God  an  object  of  worship 
infinitely  more  satisfactory  than  any  shadowy, 
impersonal  Absolute  of  German  or  Hindu  specu- 
lation, it  never  degrades  man,  as  pantheism 
always  does,  "into  a  fleeting  manifestation  of 
the  great  impersonal  spirit  of  nature."  It  seems 
to  us  that  here  in  India  one  of  the  finest  and 
most  religious  of  races  has  sunk  into  hopeless- 
ness before  the  problem  of  delivering  the  world 
from  sin,  and  that  one  of  the  reasons  of  its  fail- 
ure and  despair  has  been  the  gradual  elimination 
of  the  thought  of  sin.  Indian  philosophy  has 
almost  destroyed  the  sense  of  personal  guilt,  and 
thus  has  weakened  the  will.  Not  that  men  have 
been  delivered  from  fear  and  the  desire  to  do 
many  things  to  placate  the  Heavenly  Power,  in 
order,  through  self-torture,  to  be  reborn  into 
some  higher  existence,  and  at  last  to  reach  the 
painless  calm  of  Deity.  The  world  over,  what- 
ever be  their  philosophy,  we  hear  men  crying 
out,  "Can  any  human  arm  deliver  us?"   and  one 

'Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  6. 


142    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

is  stirred,  it  has  been  said,  "with  a  deeper, 
broader  sympathy  for  mankind,  when  he  wit- 
nesses this  universal  sense  of  dependence,  this 
fear  and  trembhng  before  the  power  of  the  un- 
seen world,  this  pitiful  procession  of  the  un- 
blessed millions  ever  trooping  on  toward  the  goal 
of  death  and  oblivion.  And  from  this  stand- 
point, as  from  no  other,  may  one  measure  the 
greatness  and  glory  of  the  Gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ." 

Christianity,  while  bringing  God  and  man 
very  close  to  each  other,  never  destroys  the 
personality  of  either,  and  while  it  deepens  man's 
conviction  of  his  alienation  from  God,  and  his 
personal  unworthiness,  it  reaches  to  him  a  re- 
storing and  delivering  hand.  Through  convic- 
tion of  sin  the  world  is  taught  to  look  to  Christ 
as  its  Redeemer.  As  one  has  said,  "It  needs 
only  to  rekindle  in  man  the  hunger  and  thirst 
after  righteousness  in  himself  or  in  the  world,  in 
order  to  bring  Christ  near  to  him,  and  to  teach 
him  to  look  upon  His  person  with  different 
eyes."  It  is  not  surprising  that  in  Asia  thus 
far  men  have  so  little  comprehension  of  some 
aspects  of  Christian  truth ;  it  is  no  wonder  that 
they  are  so  slow  to  accept  the  love  of  God  and 
to  yield  to  Him  a  personal  affection.  With 
them  God  is  remote,  or,  if  not  remote,  imper- 
sonal, or,  if  not  impersonal,  not  an  object  of 
grateful  love,  for  they  have  not  seen  Him  as  He 
is  revealed  in  the  face  of  Christ.    "To  love  God," 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  1 43 

it  has  been  said,  "would  no  more  occur  to  a 
Japanese  gentleman,  than  to  have  his  children 
embrace  and  kiss  him,"  which  is  considered  to  be 
"bad  form  "  and  never  permitted.  But  Christian- 
ity's first  command  is  to  love  God  supremely,  and 
the  disposition  and  ability  to  obey  it  are  found  in 
the  primary  disclosures  of  the  Gospel.  The  mes- 
senger to-day,  like  the  great  prophet  on  the 
banks  of  the  Jordan,  exclaims,  "Behold  the 
Lamb  of  God,  who  removes  the  world's  sin." 
Look  lovingly  at  the  great  historic  revelation  of 
Him  who  is  the  sin-bearing  Redeemer,  embos- 
omed in  the  highest  divinity.  The  revelation  of 
the  Lamb  is  the  strong  red  cord  which  binds 
into  unity  this  blessed  Book  of  Life.  God  has 
identified  Himself  with  the  long-suffering  ten- 
derness, the  pardoning  love,  and  redeeming  grace 
which  are  centered  in  the  meek  sufferer  who  died 
on  Calvary.  It  is  historically  certain  that  wher- 
ever the  Gospel  has  gained  a  strong  and  vital 
hold  of  non-Christian  peoples,  it  has  been 
through  the  preaching  of  the  Cross,  as  the  su- 
preme manifestation  of  the  suffering  love  of 
God.''  And  evermore  the  strength  of  the  Church 
has  been  not  the  disclosure  of  a  human  virtue  so 
eminent  as  to  be  called  divine,  but  the  revelation 
of  a  divine  nature  so  loving  as  to  become  human 
in  its  limitations,  in  its  lowliness  of  spirit.  If 
the  Church  has  read  the  Gospels  aright,  it  has 
made  no  mistake  in  claiming  that  humanity  is 
'Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  7. 


144    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

not  to  be  lifted  by  any  virtuous  energy  within 
itself,  but  that  God's  life  is  to  enter  the  decay- 
ing and  decrepit  race  through  Jesus,  the  Son  of 
Man,  who  died  for  human  sin,  and  re-create  the 
whole.  The  Church  of  Christ  was  not  to  rise 
from  the  bones  of  martyred  saints  and  to  be  filled 
with  the  memories  of  a  merely  human  sanctity. 
Such  a  Church  would  not  have  survived  the  tre- 
mendous assaults  of  evil  in  the  first  three  cen- 
turies. The  Christian  temple  was  to  rise  from 
the  foundation  of  God's  own  nature  disclosed  in 
the  Man  of  Nazareth,  and  its  altars  were  to  flame 
with  offerings  made  to  the  crucified  Lord  of 
glory.  Men  who  are  struck  with  sin  and  smitten 
with  moral  death  and  overwhelmed  with  despair, 
listen  with  feeble  interest  to  the  story  of  a  fel- 
low-man who,  whether  his  name  be  Socrates  or 
Buddha,  in  a  distant  age  rose  above  the  wretched 
conditions  around  him  to  a  lofty  height  of  vir- 
tue. But  the  world  is  to  be  regenerated  by  the 
story  of  Him  who  was  the  Son  of  God  dwelling 
among  men,  and  who,  for  love's  sake,  humbled 
Himself  unto  the  death  of  the  Cross. 

It  is  the  critical  and  decisive  intellectual  and 
moral  judgment  of  human  life,  the  conclusion 
reached  in  regard  to  the  nature  of  Jesus  and 
those  New  Testament  declarations  which  seem 
opposed  and  contradictory.  We  read  of  His 
humiliation.  His  dependence  on  the  Father,  His 
subjection  to  the  will  of  the  Father.  At  other 
times    we    behold    Him    claiming    oneness    with 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  1 45 

God;  we  see  Him  exercising  divine  powers,  for- 
giving sin  and  arrogating  the  authority  of  uni- 
versal judgment.  What  shall  we  say  to  these 
contradictions?  Is  it  a  human  being  naturally 
limited  and  subordinate,  or  the  Divine  One  Him- 
self laying  aside  His  glory  and  taking  upon  Him 
the  restrictions  of  our  fleshly  state?  Was  Christ 
from  below  ascending  heavenward,  or  was  He 
from  above  descending  earthward?  Is  Christ  a 
finger  pointing  toward  God,  or  is  He  also  and 
chiefly  the  hand  of  God  reaching  down  toward 
us?  Jesus  Himself,  according  to  the  Johannine 
record,  answers  and  says,  "No  man  hath 
ascended  up  into  Heaven  but  He  that  cometh 
down  from  Heaven."  And  Paul  speaks  of 
Christ  as  "God  over  all,  blessed  forever."  "He 
that  hath  seen  Me  hath  seen  the  Father,"  is  the 
solemn  declaration  of  Him  who  spake  as  never 
man  spake.  Wherever  this  truth  of  the  divinity 
of  Him  who  suffered  for  human  sin  has  been 
received,  there  and  there  alone  has  the  Church 
presented  a  doctrine  strong  enough  to  cope  with 
pantheism  and  to  give  the  soul  its  full  deliver- 
ance and  enfranchisernent.  "There  is  something 
in  pantheism,"  it  has  been  said,  "so  deep  that 
naught  in  bare  deism  can  meet  it.  Deism  is  not 
so  deep.  And  pantheism  may  well  keep  the 
house,  till  a  stronger  than  deism  comes  to  take 
possession  of  it.  In  Jesus  Christ  I  find  the  only 
true  solution  of  the  mystery." 

This  doctrine  once  received,  we  can  explain  in 


146    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

part  the  opposing  evangelic  statements.  We 
cannot  expect  in  a  far-northern  hot-house  all  the 
splendor  and  luxuriance  of  the  vegetation  that 
borders  the  Amazon ;  we  cannot  condense  the 
torrid  zone,  with  all  its  vegetable  wonders,  into 
a  glass  cage,  in  our  northern  winter.  And  so 
Christ  taught  of  the  divine  nature  that  hedged 
about  and  restricted  and  humiliated  in  the 
prison-cage  of  our  human  flesh,  as  He  was,  all  the 
unspeakable  glories  of  Heaven  and  of  Him  who 
is  from  everlasting  to  everlasting,  were  not  re- 
vealed in  the  Man  of  Nazareth.  In  Him  was 
the  fullness  of  the  Godhead  bodily,  and  pre- 
eminently His  moral  completeness,  so  far  as 
the  body  can  enclose  and  disclose  the  divine 
nature. 

Thus  we  learn  that  we  are  not  to  dissociate 
from  the  heart  of  God,  from  the  very  spiritual 
substance  of  Jehovah,  either  the  person  or  the 
sacrificial  work  of  Christ.  He  is  the  Lamb  of 
God,  and  tells  us  of  a  sinlessness  which  is  joined 
to  lowliness  and  humility;  a  limitless  capacity  to 
suffer  for  love's  sake,  the  wide-reaching,  all- 
clasping  sympathy  of  God,, — a  sympathy  as  ten- 
der for  the  darkened  children  of  Africa  as  for  the 
proud  races  of  Europe;  a  sympathy  which  em- 
braces the  famine-smitten  millions  of  this  land  as 
well  as  the  dwellers  in  England  and  America;  a 
sympathy  out  of  which,  as  out  of  the  store- 
house, the  workshop,  and  the  garden  of  the  Al- 
mighty,   have    come    Bethlehem,    Calvary,    the 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  l^J 

Man  of  Sorrows  and  acquainted  with  grief,  the 
hands  which  turned  leprosy  into  purity,  and 
distress  into  joy,  the  white  brow  of  death  with 
the  acanthine  crown  more  lustrous  than  Caesar's 
diadem,  the  suffering  heart  pierced  with  the 
spear,  the  uplifted  mercy-seat,  the  immortal 
Cross  burdened  with  a  heavenly  Victim  who  be- 
came thereon  more  than  an  earthly  Victor,  No 
wonder  that  while  the  world  moves  round  the 
Cross  stands  firm.  No  wonder  that  to  the  Chris- 
tian all  the  light  of  sacred  story  and  human  hope 
gathers  round  it.  No  wonder  that  it  has  become 
the  giant  hinge  of  the  gate  which  divides  the 
empire  of  old  night  from  the  growing  splendors 
of  the  Christian  day.  No  wonder  that  St.  Am- 
brose saw  in  its  form  the  image  of  a  destroying 
sword  thrust  into  the  earth:  the  upper  end  is 
the  hilt  about  which  is  clasped  almighty  power; 
the  outstretched  arms  are  the  guard ;  and  its 
body  is  the  sharp  blade  driven  down  into  the 
head  of  the  Old  Red  Dragon  of  sin. 

What  other  faith  has  such  a  clear,  decisive 
and  satisfying  message  to  carry  into  the  fear- 
haunted  and  defiled  sanctuary  of  the  human 
spirit?  Nothing  else  has  answered  the  question, 
"How  can  the  heart  and  hand  that  have  been 
crimsoned  by  sin  be  cleansed?"  Other  remedies 
do  not  go  to  the  root  of  the  disease,  but  Chris- 
tianity does.  It  undertakes  and  accomplishes 
the  greatest  of  all  tasks.  How  it  does  it  we 
may   not    adequately   tell.     That    it   does   it  we 


148    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

surely  know.  And  indeed  wc  may  now  rightly 
appropriate  and  adapt  to  our  use  the  old  legend 
of  the  man  fallen  into  the  pit.  The  modern  hu- 
manitarian comes  along,  and,  seeing  his  distressed 
brother,  reaches  to  him  a  hand  of  help ;  but  the 
arm  is  too  short  and  the  strength  too  feeble.  One 
class  of  teachers  comes  along,  and  says:  "You 
are  not  really  fallen ;  there  is  no  lapse  or  apos- 
tasy; it  is  only  one  stage  of  the  cycle  of  evolu- 
tion ;  but,  as  you  believe  that  you  are  in  peril 
and  in  misery,  I  recommend,  as  efificacious  reme- 
dies, pilgrimages  to  holy  places,  giving  food  to 
priests,  and  repeating  the  name  of  the  Deity." 
Then  Confucius  comes  along,  and  says:  "Help- 
less sufferer,  it  is  good  enough  for  you ;  you  have 
not  kept  the  laws  of  society,  you  are  receiving 
your  own  deserts,  in  part  at  least,  for  what  may 
be  beyond  I  do  not  know.  When  the  archer 
misses  the  center  of  the  target  he  turns  round 
and  seeks  for  the  cause  of  his  failure  in  himself." 
And  he  goes  away.  Then  Mohammed  comes 
along  and  says:  "You  are  predestined  to  this 
fate  unless  you  repeat  my  formula  and  espouse 
the  cause  of  Islam."  Then  Buddha  comes  along 
and  says,  "Make  the  best  of  the  situation  you 
are  now  in;  be  patient,  subdue  desire,  have  no 
desire  for  release.  Desire  is  a  great  evil  when  it 
is  suppressed.  Nirvana  awaits  you.  Do  not 
trouble  yourself  about  the  forgiveness  of  sins;  all 
things  are  under  the  dominion  of  inexorable  laws; 
'your  sin  will  find   you  out;  and    the  idea  of  par- 


CHRISTIA.Y    THEISM.  H9 

don  must  be  given  up."^  Then  Christ  comes 
along  with  a  face  of  brotherly  kindness,  with 
words  of  tenderness  and  hope,  brought  from  the 
bosom  of  the  Godhead,  and  with  a  hand  of  divine 
deliverance,  mighty  with  the  power  which  girt 
the  heavens  with  stars,  and  He  lifts  him  out  of 
the  horrible  pit,  and  puts  a  new  song  into  his 
mouth,  that  song  which  is  the  most  gladsome 
music  that  earth  ever  hears,  and  shall  blend  at 
last  with  the  anthems  of  those  who  sing  in 
Heaven  the  song  of  Moses,  the  servant  of  God, 
and  the  song  of  the  Lamb. 

Christianity  delivers  men  with  a  real  emancipa- 
tion through  Christ.  It  does  not  reconcile  man 
with  God,  as  pantheism  attempts,  simply  by 
obliterating  all  that  makes  him  man."  Chris- 
tianity brings  to  men  a  message  of  divine  love 
which  can  be  criticised  only  by  saying  that  it  is 
too  good  to  be  true.  Christ  may  be  said  to 
have  lived  and  taught  and  died  to  contradict 
any  such  criticism.  Human  speculations  have 
never  exhausted  the  significance  of  Christ's  sacri- 
ficial service  to  mankind.  His  moral  power  over 
men  has  become  supreme  by  those  sympathetic 
sufferings  through  which  He  has  honored  the 
divine  law. 

He  has  glorified  the  perfections  of  God's  holi- 
ness and  mercy  by  His  death  on  the  Cross;  that 
Cross  in  its  known  and  unknown  elements  of 
spiritual   power  sums   up   the  Gospel  message  to 

^Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  8. 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  IH,  Note  9. 


150    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

mankind.  It  shows  us  God,  not  inaccessible, 
but  near;  not  unmerciful,  but  gracious.  It  is 
only  through  Christ  that  men  have  ever  gotten 
worthy  and  complete  conceptions  of  God's 
nature.  A  great  modern  theologian,  speaking 
of  the  monotheism  of  Islam,  has  said:  "Indeed 
the  defects  of  Mohammed's  idea  of  God  suggest 
to  us  to  inquire  whether  it  is  possible  to  con- 
ceive worthily  of  God's  holiness,  except  by  see- 
ing it  expressed  in  a  perfectly  holy  human  life, 
or  of  His  love,  except  by  seeing  God  incarnate, 
emptying  Himself  and  as  a  man  dying  for  men 
that  they  may  be  one  with  Him  forever."  The 
foremost  need  of  mankind  is  to  know  that  God 
is  love;  and  Christianity  supplies  that  need  as  it 
appears  to  us  no  other  religion  does,  by  setting 
forth  God  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world  to 
Himself.  We  will  not  accept  any  vindication  of 
God,  any  release  from  the  weary  weight  of  this 
unintelligible  and  sorrow-laden  world,  which  like 
pantheism  is  immoral,  enervating  to  spiritual 
energy  and  to  a  holy  life.  We  may  rightly  point 
men,  bewildered  and  in  doubt,  to  the  fact  that 
God's  world  is  one  of  evolution;  that  the  divine 
picture  is  still  unfinished,  though,  from  what  has 
been  completed,  we  may  also  bear  down  on  all 
pessimistic  critics  of  God  with  the  unchallenge- 
able fact  that  men  are  themselves  largely  respon- 
sible, through  misdoing,  for  the  greater  part  of 
the  world's  misery.  But,  more  than  this,  Jesus 
Christ    is   our   theodicy,    our   vindication    of   the 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  151 

divine  government.  As  one  has  written:  "He 
did  not  satisfy  our  minds  with  arguments;  He 
did  not  solve  objections,  or  show  us  why  pain 
and  sacrifice  are  necessary  throughout  creation ; 
nay,  He  did  not  declare  God's  love  as  a  dogma 
and  prove  it  by  miracle.  The  Gospel  lies  in  His 
person.  He  took  upon  Himself  all  that  tells 
against  divine  love — all  that  has  ever  wrung  from 
men's  hearts  the  bitter  words  of  unbelief,  or  the 
more  chastened  cry  of  agonizing  inquiry,  'My 
God,  My  God,  why  hast  Thou  forsaken  me?' 
He  took  it  all  upon  Himself,  and,  as  the  Man  of 
Sorrows,  made  it,  in  His  passion  and  death  upon 
the  cross,  the  very  occasion  for  expressing  the 
depth  of  the  divine  self-sacrifice."  And  I  add: 
That  the  redemption  which  Christ  offers  is,  not  for 
time  only,  but  for  the  great  world  to  which  all 
men  hasten,  which  lies  beyond.  The  redeeming 
mercy  which  Christianity  associates  with  His  dis- 
closure of  God  reaches  into  the  life  immortal.  It 
illumines  the  darkness  of  the  grave  with  a  light 
which  neither  Buddha,  Confucius,  Mohammed, 
nor  any  Hindu  seer  or  poet  ever  held  in  his 
hands,  and  it  makes  immortality,  the  power  of 
an  endless  life,  an  uplifting,  inspiring,  purifying, 
comforting,  restraining  force  in  the  sorrowing 
and  tempted  life  which  men  live  to-day. 

After  what  has  been  said  do  I  need  to  put  to 
you  the  question  whether  or  not  the  Christian 
revelation  of  God  in  His  unity,  spirituality,  holi- 
ness,   and   redeeming   mercy  made   real   through 


152    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

His  Son,  is  a  satisfactory  basis  for  a  universal 
religion?  Is  not  Christ,  through  whom  God  be- 
comes near  and  actual  to  us,  the  desire  of  all  the 
nations?  And  do  not  the  stories  of  the  Incarna- 
tion, which  are  found  almost  everywhere,  evi- 
dence, as  Neander  said,  "a  wide-spread  desire 
and  expectation  of  a  divine  Saviour  taking  upon 
Himself  a  human  form?"  Let  me  enrich  this 
lecture  and  your  lives  with  the  words  I  take  great 
delight  in,  of  the  French  statesman  and  theo- 
logian, De  Pressense,  which  I  believe  are  a  mes- 
sage that  might  well  be  carried  to  every  child  of 
our  race  as  a  true  summary  of  the  Gospel  and 
as  an  eloquent  portraiture  of  all  those  hopes  and 
dreams  which  are  at  last  fulfilled  by  the  Incarna- 
tion.^" "The  Deliverer  is  at  length  come! — He 
for  whom  the  old  Chaldean  was  yearning  when, 
with  terror-stricken  conscience,  he  used  the  in- 
carnation of  his  seven  demons  and,  weeping  for 
his  sins,  called  upon  a  God  whom  he  knew  not. 
The  Deliverer  is  come !  whom  Egypt  foresaw 
when  she  spoke  in  words  which  she  understood 
not,  of  a  God  who  was  wounded  in  all  the 
wounds  of  his  people.  The  Deliverer  is  com.e ! 
for  whom  the  Magi  strained  their  eyes,  looking 
for  a  Saviour  greater  than  Zoroaster.  The  De- 
liverer is  come!  for  whom  the  India  of  the  Vedas 
panted  when  she  was  lifted  for  a  moment  above 
her  pantheism  by  the  intuition  of  a  Holy  God — 
One  who  could  satisfy  the  burning  thirst  for  par- 
'"  Appendix,  Lecture  III,  Note  10. 


CHRISTIAN   THEISM.  153 

don  which  none  of  the  springs  of  her  own 
rehgion  would  avail  to  quench.  The  Deliverer 
is  come!  the  true  Son  of  God,  who  alone  can  lead 
mankind  to  battle  with  full  assurance  of  victory; 
the  God  whose  image  dimly  discerned,  had  floated 
in  fantastic  incarnations  through  the  waking 
dreams  of  the  Brahman.  The  Deliverer  is  come! 
He  who  can  have  compassion  on  the  sufferer, 
and  on  all  who  are  desolate  and  oppressed,  with- 
out plunging  Himself  and  the  whole  world  into  the 
Buddhist  sea  of  Nirvana.  The  Deliverer  is  come! 
He  whom  Greece  had  prefigured  at  Delphi  and 
at  Eleusis, — the  God  who  saves  because  He  also 
has  suffered.  The  Deliverer  is  come!  He  who 
was  foretold  and  foreshadowed  by  the  holy 
religion  of  Judea,  which  was  designed  to  free 
from  every  impure  element  the  universal  aspira- 
tion of  mankind." 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK. 


They  (the  Scriptures),  as  it  were,  so  impersonate,  im- 
mortalize, and  universalize  the  conciousness  of  Christ,  that 
it  can  exercise  everywhere  and  always  its  creative  and 
normative  functions.  —  The  Place  of  Christ  in  Modern 
Theology,  Fairbairn,  p.  499. 

In  the  presence  of  a  multitude  of  religions  such  as  are 
represented  in  this  Parliament,  we  are  tempted  to  believe 
that  the  ultimate  religion  will  consist  in  a  bouquet  of  the 
sweetest  and  choicest  flowers  of  them  all.  The  graves  of 
the  dead  religions  declare  that  not  selection  but  incorpor- 
ation makes  a  religion  strong;  not  incorporation  but  recon- 
ciliation, not  reconciliation  but  the  fulfillment  of  all  these 
aspirations,  these  partial  truths  in  a  higher  thought,  in  a 
transcendent  life.  The  system  of  religion  here  represented, 
or  to  come,  which  will  not  merely  elect  but  incorporate,  not 
merely  incorporate  but  reconcile,  not  merely  reconcile  but 
fulfill,  holds  the  religious  future  of  humanity.  —  Professor 
George  S.  Goodspeed. 

If  the  dream  of  a  universal  religion  be  true — and  we 
have  but  one  science  of  the  universe;  and  if  the  Fatherhood 
of  God  and  the  Brotherhood  of  man  be  true,  there  can  be 
but  one  bond  of  spiritual  union  for  such  a  family — that  re- 
ligion cannot  possibly  be  based  on  the  Upanishads.  If  you 
make  them  your  religion,  then  you  must  be  content  to  see  it 
confined  to  a  small  corner  of  the  globe,  and  to  a  select 
coterie  even  in  that  corner.  For  if,  as  it  has  often  been  urged, 
this  ancient  system  can  be  properly  understood  only  in  the 
original  Sanskrit,  then  true  religion,  at  its  highest,  depends 
not  only  on  superior  intellect,  but  also  on  special  linguistic 
talent,  and  talent  to  study  a  dead  language!  The  thing,  at 
lowest,  is  impracticable.  —  Studies  in  the  Upanishads,  T,  E. 
Slater,  p.  72. 


FOURTH  LECTURE. 

THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK. 

It  was  my  fortune,  one  July  day  in  1879,  ^^ 
pass  by  the  Library  of  the  Anclover  Theological 
Seminary,  in  Massachusetts,  in  which  at  that 
time  were  gathered  a  company  of  American 
scholars  engaged  in  revising  the  translation  of 
the  New  Testament,  a  part  of  the  greater  com- 
pany busy  over  the  entire  Christian  Scriptures. 
Had  I  said  to  these  men,  "Is  there  any  real  de- 
mand for  such  an  immense  amount  of  scholarly 
toil  over  that  ancient  Book?  Why  should  a 
hundred  famous  scholars,  working  for  ten  years, 
lavish  on  this  version  more  of  labor  than  was 
ever  before  expended  on  a  single  volume?" — 
they  might  have  answered,  "This  is  deemed 
the  Word  of  Eternal  Life  for  one  hundred  mil- 
lions of  our  English-speaking  race,  soon  to  be 
two  hundred  millions,  already  encompassing  the 
globe,  and,  within  a  century,  to  shape  its  des- 
tinies. We  believe  that  no  labor  is  ill-spent 
that  shall  make  it  a  better  transcript  of  the 
originals.  We  expect  that  our  work  will  be  a 
new  bond  holding  together  the  nations  of  com- 
mon faith,  and  that   it  will  greatly  stimulate  the 

157 


15S  cHRisTrAxrTr,  the  world-religion. 

zeal  for  Biblical  study,  which  is  already  a  hope- 
ful sign  of  the  present  time.  Outgrown  or  obso- 
lescent, did  you  say?  The  Christian  Bible  has 
only  begun  its  beneficent  mission.  In  the  hands 
of  the  two  leading  nations  speaking  the  English 
tongue,  and  those  of  kindred  faith,  it  is  to  shine 
like  a  newly-risen  sun  over  a  darkened  globe." 

Leaving  the  Theological  Library,  I  might  have 
chanced  to  meet  that  venerable  theologian.  Pro- 
fessor Edwards  A.  Park;  and  had  I  put  to  him 
the  question,  if  the  Bible  was  not  losing  its  hold 
over  the  modern  world,  he  might  have  an- 
swered: "I  have  no  faintest  quiver  of  fear  that 
this  book  has  been  undermined  or  disintegrated 
in  an  age  when  it  is  better  understood  than  ever 
before.  It  is  an  anvil  which  has  worn  out  many 
hammers.  The  geologist's  pick  and  the  as- 
tronomer's telescope  and  the  archaeologist's 
spade  and  the  biologist's  microscope  were  once 
thought  to  have  disproved  Scripture;  Darwin's 
first  great  book  was  claimed  by  many  to  have 
sounded  the  death-knell  of  Revelation,  but  the 
most  fruitful  third  of  a  century  that  Biblical 
Christianity  has  ever  known  followed  the  publi- 
cation, in  1859,  of  Darwin's  "Origin  of  Species." 
Then,  pointing  to  the  brick  dormitories  of  the 
old  seminary,  he  might  have  said:  "From  those 
buildings,  in  my  own  time,  hundreds  of  young 
men  have  gone  forth  to  preach  the  Word  of  Life 
in  every  land  from  the  Columbia  to  the  Ganges. 
They  have  given  the  Scriptures  to  many  nations 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  1 59 

in  their  own  tongues,  and  there  is  no  man  living 
who  knows  enough  to  read  the  alphabets  of  the 
languages  into  which,  in  my  day,  Andover  stu- 
dents have  translated  the  Bible." 

Thus,  at  the  outset,  I  bring  before  you  this 
distinctive  feature  of  Christianity;  that  it  is  giv- 
ing to  the  world  its  Bible.  It  gives  it  in  a  mul- 
titude of  languages.  The  Moslem  offers  his 
Koran  in  one.  The  representatives  of  the  other 
faiths  are  not  eager  to  furnish  Christendom  with 
translations  of  their  own  sacred  books.  Some 
of  them  do  not  even  scatter  them  widely  among 
their  own  people.  The  latest  writer  on  the  re- 
ligions of  Japan  has  said:  "The  Buddhist  scrip- 
tures were  numerously  copied  and  circulated 
among  the  learned  class,  yet  neither  now  nor 
ever,  except  here  and  there  in  fragments,  were 
they  found  among  the  people.  For  although 
the  Buddhist  canon  has  been  repeatedly  im- 
ported, copied  by  pen,  and  in  modern  times 
printed,  yet  no  Japanese  translation  has  ever 
been  made. " 

Having  endeavored,  in  my  first  Lecture,  to 
show  some  of  the  Universal  Aspects  of  Chris- 
tianity ;  and  having  in  the  second  Lecture  pointed 
to  some  of  the  World-wide  Effects  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith  on  individual  and  national  life;  and 
having  in  the  last  Lecture  considered  Christian 
Theism  as  the  Basis  of  a  Universal  Religion, —  I 
ask  you  now  to  consider,  in  a  large  way,  the 
Christian    Scriptures,    which    I    have   called    the 


l6o    CHR/ST/ANITr,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION.  * 

Universal  Book,  although,  with  the  late  Professor 
Blackie,  I  prefer  to  describe  the  Bible  as  "a  col- 
lection of  books,  with  a  backbone  of  history  and 
biography  of  the  highest  kind,  stretching  over  a 
period  of  more  than  three  thousand  years." 
Christianity  presents,  as  its  text-book,  its  rich 
and  abundant  message,  the  Universal  Bible,  a 
volume  of  well-defined  proportions  and  contents 
like  the  Koran,  distinguishable  clearly  from  the 
glosses  and  comments  and  parasitic  growths 
which  have  expanded  both  the  Brahmanic  and 
Buddhistic  Scriptures  into  immense  and  varying 
proportions.  Speaking  generally,  and  not  for- 
getting the  Protestant  and  Catholic  divergence 
over  the  Apocryphal  Books,  we  may  say  that 
the  Christian  Scriptures  are  a  well-defined  col- 
lection of  sacred  writings,  fitted,  as  we  believe, 
for  the  spiritual  instruction,  and  sure,  final,  au- 
thoritative guidance  of  mankind,  in  connection 
with  which  we  must  not  forget  the  most  im- 
pressive fact,  that  the  experience  of  nineteen 
centuries  has  produced  nothing  worthy  to  be 
added  to  them. 

The  position  which  the  Bible  holds  in  Chris- 
tian faith  is  depicted  in  Kaulbach's  cartoon  of 
the  Era  of  the  Reformation.  Gathered  in  an 
ample  portico  are  the  chief  men  of  the  fifteenth 
and  sixteenth  centuries,  the  theologians,  the 
poets,  the  artists,  the  philosophers,  the  discov- 
erers— a  noble  group — in  one  of  the  greatest  ages 
of  Christian  history;  but  in   the  center  of  them 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  l6l 

all  stands  the  German  monk  of  Wittenberg, 
Martin  Luther,  with  arms  upraised  and  holding 
the  open  volume  of  God's  Word,  whose  pages 
seem  to  be  the  light  illumining  the  illustrious 
assembly.  But  ours,  far  more  than  the  Luth- 
eran, is  an  age  of  Biblical  enlightenment.  At 
International  Expositions  some  of  us  have  had 
put  into  our  hands  a  small  pamphlet,  in  which 
the  most  precious  verse  of  the  third  chapter  of 
John's  Gospel  was  printed  in  nearly  three  hun- 
dred languages  and  dialects,  and  we  have  thus 
gained  a  new  feeling  of  the  universality  of  the 
Christian  faith.  In  the  last  fifty  years  the 
Book  which  we  reverently  name  the  Word  of 
God  has  secured  admission  into  almost  every 
part  of  the  globe;  has  crossed  the  Rio  Grande 
into  Mexico,  and  the  Orinoco  and  Amazon  into 
the  heart  of  South  America;  has  entered  the 
gates  of  Japan,  China,  India,  and  has  become  a 
torch  of  light  which  is  illumining  the  Dark  Con- 
tinent. More  than  two  hundred  millions  of 
copies  in  all  of  the  great  and  most  of  the  minor 
tongues  of  men,  have  told  the  Story  of  Redemp- 
tion the  wide  world  round.  And  we  believe  it 
to  be  just  as  life-giving  to-day  as  when  it  first 
entered  into  the  spiritual  blood  of  the  English 
nation,  or  when,  in  the  fourth  century,  Con- 
stantine  ordered  the  writing  out  of  fifty  costly 
manuscripts  of  the  Bible  for  the  churches  of 
Byzantium. 

It  is  with  reverence  and  amazement  that  we 


1 63    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

think  of  this  unique  and  wondrous  Book.  To 
some  of  us  the  most  imposing  building  in  Lon- 
don is  not  Westminster  Abbey,  that  sacred  meet- 
ing-place of  religion  and  renown ;  or  the  Parlia- 
ment Houses,  with  their  memories  of  political 
strife  and  achievement;  or  the  British  Museum, 
the  chief  treasury  of  the  world's  learning;  or 
St.  Paul's  Cathedral,  the  greatest  of  Protestant 
churches:  more  impressive  still  is  the  building 
of  the  British  and  Foreign  Bible  Society,  within 
which  we  have  seen  this  Book  in  nearly  all  the 
languages  of  the ^ earth;  where  we  could  pur- 
chase it,  not  as  our  ancestors  were  compelled  to 
do  before  the  days  of  Gutenberg,  as  the  costliest 
book  in  the  world,  but  the  New  Testament  for 
an  English  penny,  and  the  whole  Bible  for  a 
sixpence;  where  we  could  lay  our  hands  on 
copies  of  the  Book  which  the  poor  and  the  per- 
secuted had  treasured  as  the  choicest  gifts  of 
Heaven;  and  where  we  could  meditate  on  the 
far-reaching  empire  of  British  commerce  which 
tends  towards  the  ultimate  prevalence  of  Biblical 
Christianity.  As  you  stand  by  the  Bank  of 
England,  in  the  heart  of  the  richest  of  capitals, 
and  see  about  you  the  commercial  houses  of  Cal- 
cutta, Melbourne,  and  Canton,  the  Banks  of 
America,  New  Zealand,  and  Australia,  Canada, 
India,  China,  and,  as  you  look  up  at  the  Royal 
Exchange,  above  whose  architrave  is  the  statue 
of  Commerce,  on  either  side  of  which  are  figures 
of  English,  Chinese,  Negro,  Greek,  Indian,  Per- 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  163 

sian,  Turkish,  and  Arabian  merchants,  while  be- 
low is  the  inscription  "The  earth  is  the  Lord's 
and  the  fullness  thereof;"  or,  as  you  walk  down 
the  Thames  to  the  port  of  London,  and  let  your 
imagination  tell  the  stories  of  those  ships  which 
do  business  in  the  great  waters;  as  you  think  of 
the  masts  which  have  shuddered  amid  the  ice- 
bergs of  Labrador,  or  have  caught  the  gleam  of 
the  Southern  constellations  "in  the  long  twilight 
of  the  Antarctic  seas;"  as  you  remember  that 
these  barks  have  borne  to  the  world's  center  the 
cotton  of  Egypt,  the  teas  of  the  Celestial  Em- 
pire, the  wheat  of  America,  the  spices  of  Cey- 
lon, the  oranges  of  Sicily,  the  timber  of  New 
Zealand,  the  coffee  of  Brazil,  the  ivory  of  the 
Congo,  and  the  furs  of  Hudson's  Bay, — you  have 
been  thankful  that  you  have  seen  also  the 
treasures  of  England's  great  Bible  House,  and 
that,  with  those  world-wide  conquests  over  land 
and  ocean  by  which  Great  Britain  has  become 
the  first  of  commercial  nations,  are  joined  the 
power  and  the  disposition  to  carry  around  the 
globe  the  knowledge  of  the  True  God  contained 
in  His  Word,  that  God  of  Righteousness  and  of 
Love  to  whom,  according  to  the  prophet,  the 
abundance  of  the  seas  shall  yet  be  converted. 

Those  who  have  carried  the  Bible  to  the  non- 
Christian  nations  have  accomplished  a  great  work 
in  opening  up  the  world  to  our  sight.  Without 
them  the  greatest  of  modern  geographers,  Carl 
Ritter,  confesses  that   he   could  not  have  written 


164    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

his  chief  book.  They  have  rendered  more  real 
service  to  geography  than  all  the  geographical 
societies.  Oriental  linguistic  learning  has  been 
largely  indebted  to  these  Christian  heralds,  trans- 
lators, and  teachers  of  the  Bible,  who  have  en- 
abled "the  German  in  his  closet"  to  compare 
more  than  two  hundred  languages. 

All  great  books  are  surrounded  in  time  with 
veneration  and  kindle  noble  enthusiasm.  Classical 
literature  has  had  its  devotees  and  its  martyrs. 
Virgil  was  the  object  of  Dante's  fervent  devo- 
tion. St.  Chrysostom  slept  with  the  comedies 
of  Aristophanes  under  his  pillow.  Alexander 
reposed  his  head  on  the  resounding  lines  of 
the  Iliad.  Petrarch  searched  sea  and  land  for 
ancient  manuscripts,  and  wept  because  he  could 
not  read  Homer  in  the  original.  Lady  Jane 
Grey,  as  Macaulay  loved  to  mention,  sat  in  the 
lonely  oriel,  fixed  to  Plato's  story  of  the  death  of 
Socrates,  unmindful  of  the  blowing  horn  and 
rushing  steed  without.  Byron  died  for  Greek 
liberty  from  devotion  to  Greek  learning,  with  the 
name  of  Greece  upon  his  lips.  But  such  inci- 
dents are  over-matched  a  hundred-fold  by  Chris- 
tian devotion  to  the  Bible,  and  the  sob  of  the 
great  Italian  sentimentalist  because  he  could  not 
read  Homer  in  Greek,  is  meaningless  beside  the 
moan  of  the  slave  girl,  sorrowing  that  she  could 
not  read  the  words  of  Jesus  in  her  own  tongue. 
Thousands  have  endured  martyrdom  for  the 
verities  of  this  Book.      The  earth  is  rich  with  the 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  1 65 

blood  of  those  who  would  not  sell  this  truth  for 
their  lives. 

We  know  how  pathetic  oftentimes  has  been 
the  patriotic  enthusiasm  of  the  Israelite  for  that 
part  of  the  sacred  Scriptures  which  he  deems 
divine,  and  regards  as  his  own  national  posses- 
sion. There  is  a  devotion  among  Moslems  to 
the  Koran  which  is  strangely  thrilling  and  sug- 
gestive, but  with  the  Jew  and  the  Christian  the 
Bible  is  not  a  charm  or  an  amulet,  but  a  fount- 
ain of  life.  While  the  Moslem  may  tell  you  of 
negro  boys  on  the  banks  of  the  Congo  who  are 
able  to  repeat  in  Arabic  the  Prophet's  holy  book 
from  the  first  Surah  to  the  last,  without  under- 
standing a  word  of  it,  the  Christian  will  point  to 
millions  upon  millions  of  men,  women,  and  chil- 
dren poring  every  Lord's  day  intelligently  over 
the  pages  which  tell  the  great  story  of  God's 
love  in  man's  redemption. 

The  sacred  literatures  of  the  world  are  almost 
immeasurable.  Recent  scholarship  has  given  us, 
in  fifty  volumes  of  translations,  the  Oriental 
Bibles,  but  they  might  have  been  expanded  into 
four  hundred  volumes.  In  the  sacred  writings 
of  the  nations  there  are  treasures  which  are 
valuable  to  the  student  of  extinct  religions,  like 
the  Book  of  the  Dead,  captured  from  Egyptian 
sepulchres,  useful  in  the  knowledge  of  the 
thought  of  ancient  Egypt  which  it  furnishes, 
but  by  the  side  of  all  living  scriptures  indeed  a 
Book  of  the  Dead.     There  are  the  old  Akkadian 


1 66    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  Assyrian  hymns;   there  are  the  sacred  writ- 
ings  of   the    Parsees,  the  Avesta,  the    records  of 
the  old  Iranian  faith,  prayer-books,  rituals  of  an 
almost  extinct  race,  which  have  been  called  "the 
ruins  of  a  religion."     There  is  the  ancient  Kojiki 
of    Japan,   a  mosaic    of    myths    joined    together 
oftentimes  with   indecent   love-stories.      But  we 
reach  a  loftier  level  or  come  more  closely  to  the 
realm  of  life,  when  we  note  the  ancient  books  of 
the  Chinese,  the  works  of  Confucius,  the  Chinese 
classics,     or    the    treatises    of    the    philosopher 
Laotze,  those  books  of  poetry  and  of  history,  of 
political  economy  and   those  maxims    of    ethics 
by  which    Chinese   thought  has  been    held   with 
iron  rigidity  for   ages.      Then    there   are  the  Tri- 
pitaka    which    contain    the    abundant    doctrines, 
metaphysics,  ethics,  and  legends  of  the  Buddhist 
faith,    expanded    in    Thibet    into    three   hundred 
and  twenty-five   folio  volumes,  found   in   shorter 
form    in    Siam,  but    even    then    more    than    five 
times  as  voluminous  as   our  Scripture,  Buddhist 
writings,  in  the  midst  of  whose  metaphysics  and 
legends    we    discover    an    abundance    of    lofty 
thought   and   noble   sentiment.     Then  there  are 
the    Vedas,  the    popular    songs    of    the    ancient 
Aryans,  sung  long  ago   in   the   fair  fields  of  the 
Indus   and   by   the   streams   of   the    Punjab,  the 
early  Vedic  literature,  which  according  to  Indian 
orthodoxy  is  inspired   in   every  line,  the  work  of 
the   Deity,  writings  supplemented,  as  w^e  know, 
by  what   has  become   much   more  potential  than 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  1 67 

the  ancient  oracles,  the  Brahmanas  and  the  phi- 
losophies of  the   Upanishads,  together  with  the 
eighteen    Puranas,    followed   by   the   sacred   and 
semi-inspired  and  enormous  poems  which  have 
exercised    for  ages   such  a  spell  over  many  mil- 
lions,   the     Ramayana    and    the    Mahabharata, 
whose  stories  are  the  delight  of  the  Hindu  fes- 
tivals.    Then  there  is,  perhaps  the  only  one  of 
the  world's  sacred  books  worth   naming  that  is 
younger  than  the  New  Testament,  unless  I  ex- 
cept the  Bible   of   the   Sikhs,  the   Mohammedan 
Koran,  which  the  faithful  deem  the  only  miracle 
needed  to  authenticate  their  religion  as  ultimate 
and   divine.      Doubtless   a  "measure   of   inspira- 
tion" belongs,  as   Mr.   Balfour  has  written,  "to 
the   ethico-religious   teachings   of   the  great  Ori- 
ental  reformers;"  "these  things,"  he  says,  "are 
assuredly  from  God,  and  whatever  be   the  terms 
in  which  we   choose   to   express   our   faith,  let  us 
not  give  color  to  the  opinion  that   His  assistance 
to    mankind    has    been    narrowed    down    to    the 
sources,    however    unique,    from   which   we    im- 
mediately and  consciously  draw  our  own  spiritual 
nourishment." 

But,  in  the  Lecture  this  afternoon,  I  shall 
hope  to  indicate  some  of  the  reasons  for  holding 
that  the  Christian  Bible,  and  that  alone,  is  worthy 
to  be  called  the  universal  sacred  Book  of  hu- 
manity. And  at  the  very  outset  we  are  con- 
fronted by  the  interesting  fact  that  the  Jewish 
and    Christian    Scriptures    originated    in    a    land 


1 68    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

which  was  itself  an  epitome  of  the  whole  world. 
The  configuration  of  Palestine,  its  immense 
variations  of  natural  scenery,  its  vast  range  of 
climate,  tell  a  unique  and  wonderful  story,  for  in 
that  little  realm  of  sacred  history,  scarcely 
larger  than  Wales  or  New  Hampshire,  we  dis- 
cover the  scenery  of  the  entire  globe.  The 
region  where  the  writers  of  this  Book  lived  and 
wrote  is  no  Arabian  desert,  like  that  from  which 
the  Koran  came  forth,  though  deserts  fringe  its 
eastern  and  southern  borders.  It  reproduces  the 
geographical  features  of  the  whole  earth,  and  in- 
dicates, it  would  seem,  that  this  Book  was  meant 
to  meet  the  wants  of  all  mankind.  It  is  full  of 
the  imagery  of  the  sea,  and  is  fitted  to  be  the 
companion  and  friend  of  those  whose  lives  are 
spent  on  the  great  waters.  Cowper's  cottager 
reads  it  on  a  quiet  English  shore,  and  the  sailor 
in  the  storm  thinks  of  Paul  on  the  Mediterran- 
ean, and  of  Him  who  calmed  the  Galilean  waves. 
The  Bible  is  full  of  pastoral  imagery.  It  tells  of 
a  God  who  is  a  shepherd,  of  a  darling  king  who 
came  from  the  sheepfold,  of  a  Saviour  whose 
advent  was  announced  to  the  keepers  of  flocks, 
and  the  multitude  who  ply  the  shepherd's  trade 
on  Scottish  Highlands  or  western  prairies  find  it 
preeminently  the  shepherd's  book.  But  the 
Bible  is  warm  with  the  breath  and  brilliant  with 
the  light  of  the  Eastern  clime.  It  tells  of  gar- 
dens and  spices  and  pomegranates,  of  roses  and 
lilies,    and    jewels    and    palms.      Its    imagery    is 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  169 

oriental  in  its  richness,  and  is  it  not,  in  this  re- 
spect at  least,  the  book  for  the  teeming  millions 
who  dwell  beneath  the  tropic  sun?  But  it  is 
also  a  book  of  mountains  and  snow  and  ice;  the 
hoar  frost  of  Lebanon  is  on  it.  The  snowy 
splendor  of  Hermon  casts  a  cold  light  on  its 
pages;  and  is  it  not  the  book  for  the  Alpine 
herdsman,  and  even  for  the  far-off  tribes  that 
watch  the  unsetting  sun  amid  the  white  and 
ghastly  solitudes  of  the  North? 

But  this  Book  which  Christians  deem  the  pre- 
eminent divine  revelation,  reflects  not  only  the 
outer  life  of  the  world,  but  also  the  whole  inner  life 
of  humanity.  We  know  that  primarily  the  Bible 
is  a  story,  the  story  of  redemption,  interwoven 
with  fascinating  biographies,  and  almost  every 
variety  of  literature.  Nothing  stirs  the  mind 
and  heart  like  action,  dramatic,  heroic,  progress- 
ive, human  action.  Can  anything  be  found  in 
literature  which,  for  the  delight  of  the  young 
and  the  instruction  of  the  aged,  is  equal  to  the 
stories  in  the  Old  and  New  Testaments?  The 
Bible  is  the  history  of  man  on  all  sides  of  his 
nature,  in  every  aspect  of  his  character,  from  the 
vilest  to  the  holiest.  When  understood,  as  the 
best  Christian  scholarship  now  understands  it,  it 
is  not  exposed  to  the  objections  which  scornful 
unbelief  has  often  flung  against  it.  The  Bible  is 
the  literature,  the  spiritual  and  choice  literature, 
of  a  great  and  heaven-guided  people,  a  literature 
resplendent    with    universal    moral   and    spiritual 


lyo    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

truths,  full  of  elements  human  and  divine,  per- 
fectly adapted  to  its  supreme  work  of  restoring 
the  soul,  not  a  treatise  of  science  or  history  by 
the  pen  of  the  Almighty  and  All-wise,  but  the 
inspired  human  record  of  prophets,  kings,  patri- 
archs, seers,  apostles,  warriors,  poets,  fishermen. 
It  is  colored  by  the  prismatic  hues  of  many 
minds;  it  is  not  the  product  of  one  generation, 
but  of  nearly  fifty,  not  in  one  language  but 
mostly  in  two,  the  simple  and  fervent  Hebrew 
for  the  Old  Testament,  the  literary  and  phil- 
osophical Greek  for  the  New\  The  divine  in- 
spiration comes  to  us  from  rabbis  and  shepherds, 
from  the  statesman-like  Moses,  the  visionary 
Isaiah,  the  practical  Peter,  the  argumentative 
Paul,  the  mystical  John.  The  word  spoken  is 
for  children  and  for  the  aged,  for  women  and  for 
men,  for  the  rich  and  the  humble,  for  the  sove- 
reign and  the  subject,  for  the  magistrate  and 
criminal,  for  the  exile,  the  sorrow-laden  and  the 
dying.  The  Spirit  of  God  reaching  us  through 
such  various  channels  appeals  to  gratitude  and 
hope,  to  fear  and  to  love.  As  one  who  denied 
its  divine  origin  has  written,  "It  goes  equally  to 
the  cottage  of  the  plain  man  and  the  palace  of  the 
king.  It  is  woven  into  the  literature  of  the 
scholar  and  colors  the  talk  of  the  street.  It  blesses 
us  w^hen  we  are  born  ;  gives  names  to  half  Chris- 
tendom;  rejoices  with  us;  has  sympathy  with 
our  mourning ;  tempers  our  griefs  to  finer  issues. 
It  tells  the  story  of  one  who  was  carpenter  and 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  I'Jl 

king,  peasant,  and  Redeemer,  child  and  youth 
and  man,  and  the  Son  of  God,  the  story  which 
charms  the  evening  fireside  and  consoles  the 
heart  of  the  dying  believer. 

Remember  that  the  Biblical  literature  has  not 
come  to  us  under  any  monotonous  form,  not  as 
a  collection  of  precepts,  strung  together  like  those 
of  the  Confucian  and  Buddhist  scriptures,  and 
not  as  the  production  of  a  single  mind,  like  the 
Koran,  where  the  chapters,  excepting  the  first, 
which  is  a  brief  prayer  of  thanksgiving,  are 
arranged  mechanically,  beginning  with  the 
longest  and  ending  with  the  briefest.  Our  Bible 
has  greater  variety  even  than  the  Hindu  sacred 
books,  which  resemble  it  in  this  respect,  but  it 
is  not  a  voluminous  and  almost  endless  encyclo- 
paedia of  undefined  and  interminable  extent, 
which  even  a  company  of  scholars,  working  for 
two  decades,  would  not  fully  explore.  It  is  a 
book  which  a  ten-years  child  may  read  in  a  fort- 
night, and  which  is  now  brought  within  the  reach 
of  the  poor,  both  in  India  and  America,  and  yet 
it  is  a  book  which  a  lifetime  of  study  never 
begins  to  exhaust.  It  has  almost  infinite  variety, 
scores  of  authors  living  through  a  period  of  per- 
haps fifteen  centuries  contributing  to  it,  and 
writing  in  different  styles  and  tongues  their 
different  kinds  of  literature.  We  have  dramatic 
poetry  like  Job,  which  many  of  us  deem  with 
Carlyle  "the  greatest  of  human  compositions," 
epic    poetry,    which    is   really   history,    like    the 


172    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

story  of  Joseph  and  David,  tragedies  which 
Shakespeare  and  the  Greeks  have  not  surpassed 
in  terror,  in  the  fate  of  Absalom  and  Ahab,  of 
Jezebel  and  Judas  and  Ananias;  pastorals  like 
Ruth,  with  which  Dr.  Johnson  amazed  and  de- 
lighted a  fashionable  circle  of  ignorant  sceptics 
in  London;  love  songs  like  that  attributed  to 
Solomon,  sententious  precepts  like  the  Proverbs; 
grandest  oratory  like  the  writings  of  Isaiah, 
which  Milton  loved  and  praised;  fascinating 
biographies  like  the  Gospels,  grave  practical  let- 
ters like  those  of  Paul,  profoundest  principles  of 
statesmanship  running  through  the  Old  Testa- 
ment prophets,  missionary  annals  like  the  Acts 
of  the  Apostles,  visions  of  earthly  and  heavenly 
victory  over  evil  like  the  Apocalypse. 

And  to  prove  its  universal  adaptation  still 
further,  the  Bible  is  a  book  which,  unlike  some 
other  sacred  scriptures,  can  be  readily  trans- 
lated. Its  loveliness  and  its  inspiring  power  do 
not  lie,  as  with  the  Koran,  in  the  original  text. 
The  Bible  can  be  put  into  all  tongues  and  be- 
come, like  Luther's  translation  into  the  German, 
or  like  the  King  James  version  into  the  Eng- 
lish, the  noblest  product  and  conservator  of  a 
great  modern  speech.  Into  hundreds  of  the 
minor  languages  and  dialects  the  Bible  has  gone 
and  has  not  lost  its  glory,  and  sometimes  it  lifts 
those  languages  and  their  people  with  them,  put- 
ting noble  conceptions  into  the  place  of  debasing 
ideas.     Where  its  truths  have  been  preached,  in 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  173 

the  last  fifty  years,  a  thousand  church  spires  rise 
above  the  vanishing  idolatries  of  the  Pacific 
Archipelago.  Going  to  new  nations,  the  Bible 
has  introduced  them  into  the  noblest  intellectual 
companionships;  has  made  them  contemporaries 
with  the  vast  and  wonderful  history  recorded  in 
its  pages;  has  placed  them  with  Adam  in  the 
primeval  garden  amid  the  trees  of  Paradise;  with 
Abraham  on  the  mysterious  mount  of  sacrifice; 
with  Moses  before  the  majesty  of  Egypt  and  the 
infinite  glory  of  Jehovah;  with  Jesus  on  the 
mount  of  Beatitudes,  the  awful  summit  of  Cal- 
vary and  the  peaceful  hill  over  which  bloomed 
the  skies  of  His  Ascension,  thus  widening  their 
intellectual  horizon  until  it  has  become  conter- 
minous with  God's  purposes  of  love  to  His  chil- 
dren. 

Does  it  not  appear  to  you  that,  in  comparison, 
the  ministry  of  other  sacred  books  has  been 
limited  to  national  areas?  Much  of  the  best 
modern  poetry,  where  the  beauty  depends  so 
much  on  the  artistic  expression,  cannot  be  suc- 
cessfully put  into  most  other  tongues,  but  the 
poetry  of  the  Psalter,  for  example,  is  primarily 
in  the  thought,  and  thought  can  go  everywhere. 
Expert  scholars  inform  us  that  the  Bibles  of  other 
peoples  when  translated  into  English  are  as 
variant  from  the  original  form  and  melody  as  can 
well  be  imagined.  Many  Mohammedans  deem 
it  a  sacrilege  for  the  Koran  to  talk  in  infidel 
tongues;  the  very  words  which  the  prophet  die- 


174    CHRISTIAN  ITT,   THE   WORLD-RELKilOX. 

tated,  and  which  his  scribes  wrote  down  on  pahn- 
leaves  and  shoulder-blades,  must  be  learned  in 
the  Arabic  and  repeated  in  the  original.  But 
there  can  be  no  life-giving  power  in  such  exer- 
cises. An  intelligent  world  is  not  to  be  per- 
manently influenced  by  superstitions.  But  the 
Bible,  entering  as  life  and  truth,  justifies  its 
claims  by  what  it  has  wrought  for  the  savage  and 
civilized  races  of  men.  It  has  lifted  the  mind 
and  transformed  the  life,  enlarged  the  horizon 
and  given  to  human  darkness  the  bright  atmo- 
sphere of  celestial  worlds.  To  the  ancient  Greek 
the  knowledge  of  the  Old  Testament  and  the 
New  brought  fresh  constellations  to  his  sensitive 
and  ever-expanding  intelligence;  and,  surveying 
the  effects  which  the  Bible  has  wrought  on  some 
modern  peoples,  like  the  Japanese,  ambitious  to 
get  out  of  the  primitive  stages  of  civilization,  one 
writer,  using  a  thoroughly  modern  metaphor, 
tells  us  that  the  "translation  of  the  Bible  is  like 
building  a  railroad  through  the  national  intel- 
lect." 

Mr.  Lowell  has  said  that  the  only  universal 
authors  are  Dante,  Shakespeare,  Cervantes,  and 
Goethe.  They  translate  well,  both  from  their 
style  and  from  their  broad  humanity.  But  the 
four  magnates  of  literature  whom  he  eulogizes, 
when  compared  with  the  writers  of  the  Scrip- 
tures, reach  but  a  few,  and  they  do  not  speak  or 
claim  to  speak  with  any  authority  on  the  chief 
themes  of  human  concern,  and  we  may  say  with- 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  1 75 

out  contradiction,  that  the  most  popular  poet  in 
all  the  world  to-day  is  none  of  these,  but  David 
of  Bethlehem,  using  that  name  to  represent  the 
succession  of  singers  who  gave  us  the  chief  de- 
votional book  of  the  world.  And  I  think  we 
may  safely  argue  the  permanent  influence  of  the 
Biblical  literature  on  the  modest  ground  that  it 
is  literature,  and  not  a  book  of  science,  law,  or 
systematized  theology.  Books  of  science  are 
left  behind  in  the  march  of  progress,  while  the 
great  poets  are  always  in  the  vanguard  of  human 
life.  But  the  Biblical  literature  abides  also,  be- 
cause it  speaks  through  object  lessons  to  the 
child-heart,  which  comes  back  to  earth  with  each 
new  generation,  living  in  its  own  paradises  and 
delighting  in  the  pictures  which  bring  immortal 
truth  to  youthful  eyes,  and  furthermore,  be- 
cause, while  thus  addressing  the  soul  of  child- 
hood, it  reaches  the  depths  of  all  human  need, 
keeping  ahead  of  the  most  disciplined  mind  and 
luring  the  imagination  on  and  on  with  dreams  of 
the  infinite  and  eternal.  I  say  that  it  fits  into 
all  men's  needs,  those  old  and  ever-returning 
spiritual  wants  which  belong  to  men  not  as  mem- 
bers of  a  nation,  but  as  members  of  a  race. 
And  yet,  by  its  vastness,  variety,  and  constant 
revelation  of  new  truths  and  adaptations,  it 
keeps  abreast  of  the  eager  intellect  and  yearning 
heart  with  every  new  occasion  and  epoch  of  his- 
tory. What  an  inspiring  power,  preeminent 
among  all  books,  this  volume   has  had  over  the 


176    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

intellectual  life!  The  most  radiant  and  productive 
period  in  the  literary  history  of  England,  the 
century  extending  from  the  birth  of  Shakespeare 
to  the  close  of  Milton's  life,  was  that  wherein, 
according  to  perhaps  the  wisest  of  English  his- 
torians, the  people  became  the  people  of  one 
Book,  and  that  book  the  Bible.  This  is  no  sur- 
prise. The  Bible  presents  a  series  of  unequaled 
literary  phenomena.  Paul  has  left  us  profounder 
analyses  of  character,  of  the  human  soul  in  its 
conflicts  with  sin,  than  we  can  discover  else- 
where. 

A  Book  which  contains  the  Gospel  of  John, 
which  Schaff  called  "the  most  important  literary 
production  ever  written  by  man;"  a  Book  which 
has  given  to  mankind  all  the  pure  and  strong  and 
vigorous  monotheism  now  prevailing  in  our  race, 
among  nations  as  diverse  as  those  who  dwell  in 
Scotland  and  those  who  dwell  in  Arabia;  a  Book 
whose  prolonged  history  was  a  manifest  prophecy 
of  the  Messiah,  culminating  in  the  matchless 
person  and  teachings  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  through 
whose  record  there  runs  by  the  side  of  human 
sin  the  current  of  divine  redemption;  a  Book 
which  opens  with  creation's  story,  written  long 
before  the  birth  of  science,  and  conformed  to  that 
theory  of  development  from  the  simple  to  the 
complex,  and  from  the  lower  to  the  higher, 
which  science  now  wears  as  its  most  lustrous 
crown ;  a  Book  which  deals  with  those  stories  of 
the  earth's  oric^in  and  of   the   earth's  destruction 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  177 

by  a  deluge  in  such  a  way  as  to  demonstrate  its 
moral  superiority  above  the  other  traditions  and 
accounts  which  have  been  left  to  us;  a  Book 
which  has  furnished  in  its  Psalms,  written  more 
than  two  thousand  years  ago,  the  one  devotional 
volume  most  acceptable  to  the  enlightened 
nations  of  to-day;  those  Psalms  on  which  John 
Bright  declared  he  would  be  content  to  stake  the 
question  whether  there  is  or  there  is  not  a  Divine 
revelation ;  a  Book  which  has  furnished  mankind 
the  authority  for  that  Sabbath  of  rest,  without 
which  civilization  would  rapidly  sink  into  phy- 
sical decay  and  moral  barbarism ;  a  Book  which 
through  its  flaming  insistence  on  righteousness, 
its  doctrine  of  retribution  and  its  disclosures  of 
the  Christ,  oppose  the  degrading  and  downward 
tendencies  of  sin,  and  is  lifting  great  portions  of 
our  race  into  a  better  manhood,  and  which  car- 
ries on  the  forefront  of  its  Gospel  the  priceless 
truth  of  immortality,  making  our  earth  in  spite 
of  its  sorrows  and  transgressions,  the  suburb  and 
gateway  of  celestial  life, —  shines  so  pre-emi- 
nently, that  many  Christians  feel  disinclined  to 
bring  it  in  comparison  with  other  sacred  writings. 
Robertson  Smith  has  said,  "We  have  no  need 
to  go  outside  of  the  Bible  history  to  learn  any- 
thing of  God  and  His  saving  will  toward  us." 
Because  the  Bible  alone  is  sufficient,  it  seems  to 
us  that  it  will  ultimately  supplant  other  sacred 
literatures.  Unlike  them  it  is  unified  by  a 
divine    purpose,    a    historic    continuity    running 


17S    CHRISTIANIT7',   THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

through  it  all.  The  various  books  in  the  library 
of  our  Scriptures  are  held  into  oneness  by  the 
prophetic  character  of  the  older  volumes,  and 
the  historic  consummations  of  the  later.  Or  we 
may  find  the  unity  of  the  Scriptures  in  the  pro- 
gressive ethical  development  which  culminates  in 
Jesus  Christ.  Or  we  may  say  that  the  Bible  is 
unified  by  the  revelation  of  the  kingdom  of  God 
which  runs  through  its  pages.  Or,  looking  at 
the  Scriptures  as  a  history  of  Redemption,  we 
may  say  that  Christ  is  the  unifying  principle  of 
this  multiple  volume,  and  that  from  Abel's  altar 
to  the  coronation  of  the  Lamb,  there  is  a  gradual 
and  glorious  progress  of  redemptive  disclosure. 
We  may  find  in  it  the  truths  which  are  cherished 
by  all  earth's  sages  and  saints,  the  best  which 
Socrates  and  Seneca  gave  to  Greek  and  Roman, 
and  every  higher  principle  and  precept  of  the 
Koran,  and  all  that  is  true  in  every  cherished 
writing  of  Indian  philosopher  and  poet  and 
moralist ;  but  far  more  than  this  it  is  distin- 
guished from  other  literature,  as  one  has  written, 
"Because  the  noble  truths  which  exist  every- 
where as  scattered  fragments  are  here  to  be 
found  purified  and  centralized,  even  as  the  silver 
from  the  earth  is  tried  and  purified  seven  times 
in  the  fire."  The  doctrines  which  the  human 
mind  and  heart  have  guessed  at,  and,  it  may  be, 
involved  in  much  of  error,  are  found  in  the 
Scriptures,  freed  from  all  weakness  and  defile- 
ment.     The  Biblical  teachings  in  regard  to  God 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  179 

and  immortality,  incarnation,  and  the  atonement 
bear  the  brightness  of  celestial  truth. 

I  rejoice  with  another  "at  the  richness  of  the 
Biblical  element  in  non-Christian  literature." 
For  example,  the  Indian  Missionary,  John  Laza- 
rus, of  Madras,  in  his  dictionary  of  Tamil  prov- 
erbs, says:  "Many  of  these  sayings  can  bear 
comparison  with  those  of  the  greatest  sages  the 
world  has  ever  produced;  some  are  worthy  of 
the  divine  Teacher  Himself.'"  I  feel  the  sacred- 
ness  of  human  aspiration  after  God  everywhere 
and  of  the  deepest  human  thought  about  duty. 
One  has  said:  "Let  the  student  really  master  a 
philosophy  like  Confucianism,  and  he  will  better 
illustrate  the  Christian  grace  of  humility." 

The  prophets  of  that  elder  day, 
The  slant-eyed  sages  of  Cathay, 
Read  not  the  riddle  all  amiss 
Of  higher  life  evolved  from  this  ; 
Nor  doth  it  lessen  what  He  taught, 
Or  make  the  Gospel  Jesus  brought 
Less  precious,  that  His  lips  retold 
Some  portion  of  that  truth  of  old. 

The  domain  of  revelation  is  world-wide,  but 
while  we  grant  this,  there  is  no  need  of  our  con- 
founding the  "mixed,  uncertain  whisperings, 
with  the  articulate  voicings  of  the  Word."  Non- 
Christian  literature  shows  that  men  everywhere 
have  been  groping  after  the  perfect,  and,  though 
they  have  seen  it  only  in  fragments,  they  will  yet 
rejoice  in  the  pleroma,  the  fullness  which  is  found 

'  Appendix,  Lecture  IV,  Note  i. 


iSo    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

in  the  Christ  and  in  His  Word.  Mohammedan- 
ism has  been  a  tremendous  force,  and  Islam 
gained  something  at  least  from  the  Old  Testa- 
ment Scriptures.  Kuenen  described  Islam  as 
"the  kernel  of  Judaism  transplanted  to  Arabian 
soil."  But  the  human  heart  needs  for  its  purest 
and  highest  life  not  fragmentary  but  full-orbed 
spiritual  truth,  and  the  Bible  rightly  interpreted, 
the  Bible  in  its  "total  impression,"  is  the  Word 
of  Him  in  whom  are  all  the  riches  of  wisdom  and 
knowledge. 

The  instructed  Christian  does  not  believe  in 
the  Scriptures  as  a  sacred  charm  or  rosary,  where 
each  bead  is  as  holy  and  beneficent  as  the  rest. 
The  writers  of  our  Bible  were  not  mere  types  in 
the  hand  of  the  divine  printer.  The  truth  is 
that  the  Bible  is  an  organic  growth  like  the  hu- 
man body.  All  parts  of  it  may  be  essential  to 
perfection  though  all  are  not  essential  to  the 
continuance  of  vitality.  Hence  questions  about 
the  perfection  of  different  portions  of  the  Scrip- 
tures are  like  inquiries  about  the  perfection  of 
different  members  of  the  body,  and  more  still, 
like  questions  about  the  perfection  of  different 
stages  in  the  same  growth.  The  man  of  fifty  is 
a  completer  revelation  of  humanity  than  the 
child  of  ten,  but  the  child  may  be  as  perfect  for 
that  stage  of  development  as  the  man  for  his 
period  of  growth.  So  the  earlier  books  of  the 
Bible  may  be  considered  the  childhood  of  reve- 
lation, and   are   as   perfect   for  their  stage  in  the 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  i8l 

progress  of  the  Scriptures,  as  the  New  Testa- 
ment is  for  the  later  disclosures  of  God.  They 
were  the  great  foundation  stones  that  must  be 
laid  solid  and  deep  before  the  splendid  super- 
structure could  lift  its  pinnacles  toward  the  sky. 
Hard  discipline  was  required  to  teach  funda- 
mental truths.  God  took  Israel  in  hand  and  by 
the  hand.  He  is  revealed  in  signs  and  terrible 
wonders;  He  is  made  real  by  anthropomorphism. 
These  representations,  figurative,  bold,  passionate 
and  poetical,  have  misled  both  the  unimaginative 
theologian  and  the  burlesquing  unbeliever;  but 
because  they  are  passionate  and  not  coldly 
scientific,  bold  and  not  guarded,  these  descrip- 
tions made  enduring  impressions  on  the  hard 
heart  of  Israel,  and  the  constant  picture-lessons 
in  tabernacle  and  altar,  in  temple  and  solemn 
feasts  are  not  useless  in  the  world's  moral  educa- 
tion to-day,  for  dull  and  gross  humanity  in  part 
remains.  The  world  needs  the  whole  Bible,  the 
earlier  revelation  is  necessary  to  the  support  and 
explanation  of  the  later.  The  New  Testament, 
it  has  often  been  said,  "canonizes  the  old,"  and 
the  deeper  we  study  them  both,  the  stronger  I 
think  will  be  the  conviction  that  this  Book  in  its 
entirety  is  fitted  to  universal  need,  and  that  to 
divide  it  into  fragments,  is  to  diminish  its 
power. 

Under  the  Biblical  training  we  do  not  behold 
any  retrogression,  as  in  some  other  sacred  litera- 
tures, to  lower  conceptions;  but  rather  a  steady 


l82    CHRISTIANITT,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

advance  to  an  ethical  monotheism,  crowned  by 
the  Messianic  Revelation  in  Christ.  Under  the 
tuition  of  the  Bible  there  is  no  down-sinking  to 
inferior  standards.^  The  thoughts  of  men  are 
rectified,  moralized  and  increasingly  spiritualized 
along  the  line  of  progressive  development.  Why 
did  not  the  religion  of  Israel  "sink  to  the  level 
of  common  Semitic  heathenism  and  perish  like 
the  religions  of  other  Semitic  peoples"  except 
for  the  energizing  and  uplifting  power  which  God 
gave  to  the  great  prophets  in  the  Assyrian  and 
Babylonian  periods?  In  Israel  we  behold  a 
unique  phenomenon,  prophecy  not  sporadic, 
occasional,  and  comparatively  feeble,  as  among 
other  peoples,  but  historic  and  continuous,  an 
institution  shaping  the  life  of  the  nation.  I 
know  not  where  else  to  find  a  race  and  succession 
of  moral  reformers  of  such  lofty  stature,  com- 
bining "a  message  for  the  present,  a  body  of 
truth  for  all  time,  and  a  foregleam  of  the  eternal 
future." 

1  know  that  the  objection  is  occasionally 
offered  that  the  coarse  strength  of  the  prophetic 
word  often  unfits  it  for  us.  When  the  complaint 
is  made  by  fastidious  men  that  the  Scriptures 
are  not  always  adapted  to  the  spiritual  refine- 
ment and  sensitiveness  of  our  time,  the  proper 
answer  is  "By  their  fruits  ye  shall  know  them." 
The  Bible  faces  things  as  they  are  in  a  world 
gone  wrong,  and  as  the  scenes   in  human  life  are 

2  Appendix,  Lecture  IV,  Note  2. 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  1 83 

not  arranged  with  the  elegant  luxury  of  a  French 
salon,  where  every  object  attracts  and  pleases 
the  sensitive  and  critical  eye,  so  the  Bible,  the 
Book  of  Life,  is  not  a  dilettante's  book.  It 
presents  many  things  that  are  common,  ugly 
and  terrible,  and  uses  the  plain  language,  the 
straightforward  speech  of  the  simple  ages  of 
mankind.  It  aims  not  to  flatter  the  drawing- 
room  fastidiousness,  which  cares  for  words  rather 
rather  than  for  things,  and  is  more  shocked  by  a 
breach  of  conventional  etiquette  than  by  the 
breaking  of  the  statutes  of  Mount  Sinai.  Speak- 
ing of  those  works  which  are  vulgarly  called 
coarse,  Hamerton  once  wrote:  "The  combination 
of  the  highest  mental  refinement  with  some 
roughness  of  material  accompaniment,  is  as 
natural  as  that  other  very  common  combination 
of  perfect  visible  finish  with  low  intellectual  cul- 
ture." Surely  we  perceive  the  truth  of  this  in 
our  observations  of  men.  It  is  true  with  litera- 
ture, as  witnessed  in  Dante  and  Shakespeare. 
It  is  true  in  the  Bible,  whose  refinement  is  not  a 
superficial  polish,  but  the  inner  light  of  hoHness. 
The  Bible  is  an  honest  book,  reflecting  the  ages 
when  it  was  written,  and  recording  the  crimes  and 
errors  of  its  own  heroes.  If  it  is  compelled  to 
paint  the  vices  of  men,  it  makes  them  appear 
unlovely.  It  does  not  set  out,  like  Hogarth,  to 
depict  the  sins  of  mankind,  but  when  sins  are 
painted  they  are  brought  out,  in  honest  Ho- 
garth's way,  so  as  to  repel   and  never  to  attract. 


184    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

What  an  unspeakable  difference  between  all  this 
and  the  classic  and  other  poetry  which  relates  the 
immoral  escapades  of  gods  and  demi-gods! 

Max  Muller  has  drawn  attention  to  the  fact 
that  in  the  sacred  books  of  the  East  by  the  side 
of  so  much  that  is  "fresh,  natural,  simple,  beau- 
tiful, and  true,"  is  so  much  that  seems  to  him 
"not  only  unmeaning,  artificial,  and  silly,  but 
even  hideous  and  repellent."  But  surely,  we 
who  hold  that  to  our  Scriptures  were  given  a 
peculiar  inspiration  and  final  authority  over  the 
human  spirit  have  no  dif^culty  in  suggesting  an 
explanation  of  this  phenomenon.  We  find  in 
our  sacred  literature  the  main  stem  or  stream  of 
God's  self-revelation  and  we  do  not  expect  to 
discover  in  those  national  religious  developments 
which  are  only  auxiliary  to  it  or  a  preparation 
for  it,  such  continuous  energy,  such  ethical  prog- 
ress and  purity  of  moral  life. 

We  believe  that  man  is  a  being  capable  of 
receiving  such  a  divine  revelation  as  was  given 
to  Israel ;  we  believe  that  man  needed  such  a  dis- 
closure from  heaven,  not  to  teach  him  the 
secrets  of  chemistry  and  zoology,  not  to  unveil 
the  mysteries  of  light  and  electricity,  but  to 
assure  him  that  God  is  love,  that  God  has 
mercy,  and  that  God  has  provided  a  home  for 
His  children  beyond  the  tomb.  -We  believe  that 
the  claim,  contained  in  the  Scriptures,  that  their 
origin  is  supernatural,  is  justified  by  the  un- 
paralleled moral  dignity  of  Christ,  who  laid  His 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  185 

hand  in  divine  authentication  upon  the  Old 
Testament,  and  is  Himself  the  hfe  and  sub- 
stance of  the  New;  we  are  encouraged  in  our 
faith  by  the  moral  results  which  have  followed 
the  reception  of  this  Book  as  the  Word  of  Life; 
we  believe  that  the  Bible  has  upon  it  a  stamp 
from  above,  a  supernatural  seal,  especially  in  the 
evangelical  history  which  gives  us  the  life,  death, 
and  resurrection  of  Jesus  Christ;  we  believe  that 
there  runs  through  this  Book  a  stream  of  pre- 
diction, which,  drawing  our  conclusions  from  the 
fulfillments  already  made,  as  for  example  from 
that  conspicuous  and  ever  present  illustration, 
the  Jewish  people,  could  have  had  no  other 
origin  than  the  mind  of  God  Himself. 

When  we  say  that  the  Scriptures  are  from 
God,  we  certainly  do  not  mean  that  they  came 
to  earth  as  an  aerolite  which  dropped  from  an- 
other sphere.  The  Book  is  thoroughly  human 
as  well  as  truly  divine;  God  spake  through  the 
prophets  as  well  as  to  them ;  they  preserve  their 
natural  differences  and  the  Book  is  man's  record 
of  God's  revelation.  That  record  has  its  human 
peculiarities  and  limitations,  by  which  it  is  more 
perfectly  adapted  to  our  needs.  But  there  are 
in  the  Book  elements  of  such  dignity,  truth,  au- 
thority, power,  universality  of  application,  unity 
most  marvelous  in  the  midst  of  diversity  most 
conspicuous  as  to  set  it  apart  from  and  above  all 
other  writings.  Even  if  you  could  prove  that 
the  authors  of  the  Scriptures  had  made  mistakes 


1 86    CHRISTIANITY,   THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

in  zoology  and  chronology,  you  would  not  de- 
stroy the  supreme  value  or  stain  the  peerless 
splendor  of  our  Bible.  A  signboard  that  points 
the  traveler  with  unerring  certainty  toward  vir- 
tue and  heaven,  is  the  most  precious  thing  on 
earth,  even  if  should  you  discover  that  it  had 
been  erected  by  unscientific  hands  and  painted 
by  unskilled  fingers.  Those  devout  literary 
critics  whose  investigations  are  now  stirring  so 
much  eager  controversy,  find  the  Bible  not  less 
but  greater,  not  weaker  but  stronger,  more  in- 
tensely human  and  more  truly  divine  than  be- 
fore. Enthusiasm  for  the  Scriptures  will  not  be 
lessened  by  the  results  of  devout  criticism. 
Martin  Luther  did  not  intend  to  bind  men  as 
slaves  to  the  letter  of  the  Scriptures,  nor  to  any 
theory  of  their  literal  infallibility  in  every  minor 
particular.  The  doctrine  which  the  brilliant 
Professor  Huxley  approved  in  the  champions  of 
the  Scriptures,  the  teaching  that  the  least  error 
in  the  most  unimportant  matter  of  science  or 
history  is  inconsistent  with  a  true  theory  of  in- 
spiration and  is  subversive  of  the  Bible;  the  un- 
tenable claim,  against  which  he  loved  to  couch 
his  lance  and  which  binds  our  hopes  of  salvation 
to  the  absolute  accuracy  of  the  itinerary  of 
Israel's  wanderings  through  the  wilderness,  is 
more  of  a  hinderance  than  a  help  in  the  present 
generation.  The  Bible  is  not  the  Christian's 
dictator,  but  his  gracious  illumination,  his  wise, 
gentle   and   sufficient   guide.      It   does  not  dwarf 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  187 

the  powers  of  humanity  and  thwart  its  develop- 
ment by  taking  away  the  stimulus  to  energetic 
work  which  is  furnished  by  the  exhaustless 
domain  of  explored  truth.  It  does  not  cripple 
those  faculties  whose  life  is  in  their  activity,  or 
bid  men  to  stultify  reason.  We  might  question 
a  book  which  when  all  nature  was  saying  to 
man,  "Examine,  explore,  search,  conquer," 
lifted  up  its  voice,  and  said,  "Vain  and  needless 
labor.  Open  my  pages;  all  truth  is  here."  But 
what  does  this  volume  say?  "The  fear  of  the 
Lord  is  the  beginning  of  wisdom,  and  to  depart 
from  evil  is  understanding."  The  Bible  is  a 
witness  to  this  fundamental  truth,  and  while  its 
store  is  so  rich  that  poet  and  statesman  and  phi- 
losopher may  find  in  its  golden  treasury  much 
that  is  of  priceless  worth,  still  the  Word  of  God 
is  primarily  a  Book  of  Religion;  it  reaches  down 
far  below  and  rises  far  above  all  other  knowl- 
edge. It  appeals  to  the  innermost  nature  of 
man,  and  when  human  wisdom  has  confessed,  as 
Solomon  did  and  Goethe  has  done,  that  all  is 
vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit,  it  enters  the  heart 
like  a  torch  into  a  darkened  cavern.  "The  en- 
trance of  Thy  word  giveth  light;"  by  it  men  are 
brought  back  to  the  Supreme  Truth  around 
which,  like  the  wandering  globes  around  the  sun, 
all  other  truths  revolve.  The  law  of  the  Lord  is 
perfect,  restoring  the  soul. 

All  men  need  a  perfect   moral   standard.      Ex- 
amine   the    Ten    Commandments    given    in    the 


150    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

dawn  of  recorded  history;  see  there  a  divine 
hand  smiting  down  idolatry  with  all  its  accom- 
panying degradations.^  See  there  a  divine  hand 
building  up  the  institution  of  the  family.  See 
there  God's  thought  of  purity  and  of  the  sacred- 
ness  of  life  and  of  possessions;  see  there  the 
divine  idea  of  truth,  of  regard  for  human  rights, 
and  then  open  the  New  Testament  and  read  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount,  the  fulfilling  of  the  old 
Law,  and  then  put  to  yourself  the  question: 
"Can  I  discover  elsewhere  so  perfect  a  standard? 
Can  I  find  a  moral  legislation  which  covers  so 
mercifully  and  completely  all  human  life?"  I 
look  around  the  world,  and  discover  that  wher- 
ever this  Book  has  gone,  men,  though  clinging 
to  other  scriptures,  have  been  awakened  out  of 
moral  lethargy — they  have  felt  themselves  at 
once  challenged  and  condemned,  even  though 
they  hold  in  their  hands  the  scattered  gems  of 
ethical  and  spiritual  truth  which  gleam  from 
other  sacred  books  than  the  Christian.*  Where, 
outside  of  the  area  which  is  blessed  by  the  Bible, 
will  you  find  true  honor  and  high  privilege 
granted  to  womanhood  ?  The  greatest  of  all 
emancipations,  that  by  which  the  Christian  ideals 
of  the  family  have  superseded  the  non-Chris- 
tian, whether  savage  or  civilized,  is  co-extensive 
with  the  influence  of  the  Christian  Scriptures. 
I  might  tell  the  story  of  what  this  Book  has  done 

^Appendix,  Lecture  IV,  Note  3. 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  IV,  Note  4. 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  1 89 

for  the  souls  of  women:  how  in  Zululand,  girls 
who  were  to  be  exchanged  for  cattle  have 
learned  that  they  were  bought  by  the  precious 
blood  of  Jesus  Christ,  always  and  everywhere 
the  friend  and  helper  of  womankind ;  how  in 
Syria,  those  who  had  been  left  in  mental  and 
moral  babyhood  have  learned  from  the  New 
Testament  the  liberating  truths  of  the  Gospel; 
how  in  Japan,  the  daughter,  who,  for  the  sake  of 
her  parents,  has  sold  herself  to  shame,  and  is 
made  the  theme  of  many  a  praiseful  story — 
where  "no  one  ever  thinks  of  questioning  the 
right  of  a  parent  to  make  this  sale  any  more 
than  he  would  allow  a  daughter  to  rebel  against 
it" — has  learned  from  Mary's  Son  that  there  is 
earthly  and  heavenly  enfranchisement  for  her; 
how  in  China,  where,  ■  from  the  cradle  to  the 
grave,  her  life  is  one  long-drawn  woe,  whose 
great  teacher  never  thought  of  remedying  misery 
by  delivering  woman  from  polygamy  and  social 
inferiority;  and  in  India, ^  where  often  the  sor- 
rows of  her  lot  in  enforced  widowhood,  would 
melt  any  heart  not  dead  to  generous  feeling — in 
India,  where  hundreds  of  non-Christian  social 
reformers  have  at  last  risen  up  to  fight  the  con- 
secrated cruelty,  old  at  least  as  the  laws  of  Manu, 
— woman  is  finding  the  Bible  an  emancipator 
which,  while  breaking  the  chains  of  earthly 
bondage  lifts  her  imprisoned  soul  to  heights  and 
hopes  beyond  the  stars.  When  her  children 
'Appendix,  Lecture  IV\  Note  5. 


190    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

expire  in  her  arms,  or  are  torn  from  her  love  to 
be  murdered,  as  in  China,  and  that  grief  which 
makes  many  a  little  grave  so  sacred  wrings  her 
heart,  she  is  not  left  to  mourn  in  utter  desolate- 
ness  of  spirit,  for  she  has  heard  of  One  who 
loves  and  shepherds  her  lost  lambs  in  fields 
Elysian,  and  declares  that  of  such  is  the  king- 
dom of  heaven. 

What  a  wondrous  ennobling  power  this  Book 
has  had  over  all  willing  to  receive  it !  What  we 
call  Puritanism  was  one  of  the  greatest  efforts 
ever  made  to  get  the  Bible  enshrined  into  social 
law  and  national  habits,  and  to  it  are  due  the 
liberty  and  purity  of  English-speaking  nations. 
Even  conservative  Oxford,  from  her  chair  of  his- 
tory, has  said  that  England's  progress  for  two 
hundred  years  on  its  moral  and  spiritual  side, 
was  due  to  Puritanism.  The  idolatrous  Mala- 
gasy gets  the  Bible  into  his  heart  and  suffers 
death  by  torture  rather  than  surrender  it  or  his 
faith  in  it.  Professor  Drummond  goes  to  Africa, 
and  finds  illustrations  of  Christian  character 
among  newly-converted  believers  in  God's  Word 
which  appear  to  him  among  the  finest  in  the 
world.  A  native  preacher,  holding  up  a  copy  of 
the  Scriptures  before  some  of  the  Christian  in- 
habitants of  the  South  Sea  Islands,  exclaims 
"This  is  my  resolve:  the  dust  shall  never  cover 
my  Bible,  the  moth  shall  never  eat  it,  the  mil- 
dew shall  never  rot  it,  my  light  and  my  joy." 
And    late    in    his    life,  the    all-accomplished  poet 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  19I 

and  philosopher,  Coleridge,  who  had  ranged  so 
widely  through  literature,  withdrew  from  his 
usual  studies  and  took  with  him  in  his  travels 
only  a  small  English  New  Testament,  saying  to 
his  friends  "I  have  only  one  Book,  and  that  is 
the  best." 

But  we  may  believe  with  Ewald  that  "in  the 
New  Testament  is  all  the  wisdom  of  the  world," 
and  with  Sir  William  Jones  that  "in  the  Bible 
are  more  true  sublimity,  more  exquisite  beauty, 
more  pure  morality,  more  important  history  and 
finer  strains  of  poetry  and  eloquence  than  can  be 
collected  from  all  other  books,  in  whatever  age 
or  language  they  may  have  been  written,"  and 
yet  not  discover  that  the  chief  secret  of  the  Bible 
is  not  truth,  so  much  as  life,  or  rather  life  through 
the  medium  of  truth.  It  appears  to  possess  or 
to  be  accompanied  by  a  divine  energy  working 
unparalleled  miracles.  Even  sceptics  are  im- 
pressed by  it.  One  who  sees  no  difference  worth 
mentioning  between  the  theology  of  Christ  and 
the  theology  of  Mohammed,  wrote  not  long  since 
in  the  Fortnightly  Reviezv:  ' '  Look  at  what  Chris- 
tian missionaries  have  done  in  the  Pacific 
Islands,  New  Guinea,  and  Madagascar.  In  that 
latter  island  British  evangelists  really  fought  out 
the  battle  of  civilization  without  costing  a  penny 
or  a  drop  of  blood  to  any  European  government. 
The  same  work  is  in  its  inception  in  the  center 
of  Africa.  Who  first  put  steamers  on  Lakes 
Tanganyika    and    Nyassa?     Who    first   explored 


192    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  great  affluents  of  the  Congo?  A  little 
steamer  of  the  Baptist  Mission  Society."  This 
materialist  has  no  sympathy  with  the  motive 
forces  which  are  back  of  Christian  missions,  but 
as  a  political  economist  he  is  glad  in  the  interests 
of  education  and  civilization  to  encourage  the 
work  of  a  Biblical  Christianity.  "China  and 
Japan  may  send  delegations  to  America  to  study 
our  ways  and  take  back  the  force  of  our  institu- 
tions and  models  of  our  industries,  but  one  mis- 
sionary will  do  more  to  start  the  living  currents 
of  civilization  than  all  the  delegations,  simply 
because  he  begins  further  back  in  his  teachings 
and  awakens  conscience  and  the  sense  of  self- 
hood and  the  dignity  of  human  nature.  He 
goes  to  a  nation,  with  the  Bible  in  his  hand,  a 
simple  and  pathetic  figure,  less  than  a  drop  in 
the  ocean;  but  he  sinks  in  the  depths  only  to 
reappear  in  some  other  form — the  Bible  has 
grown  into  a  charter  of  freedom  and  of  true 
national  life.  He  seems  to  be  doing  little,  but 
like  the  Norse  god,  who  drained  his  drinking 
horn,  and  lo!  the  sea  was  narrowed,  he  often 
finds  himself,  in  the  midst  of  results  miraculous 
and  great."  Always  and  everywhere  the  Bible 
brings  life;  its  principles,  which  are  universal, 
touch  the  springs  of  love  and  hope  and  fear, 
and  are  in  the  greatest  contrast  with  any  system 
which  "fills  the  whole  course  of  life  with 
punctilious  minutiae  of  observances." 

Englishmen   and  Americans   are   racially   akin 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  193 

to  the  men  who  wrote  the  Vedas  and  drew  out 
those  astounding  compositions,  the  philosophical 
treatises  of  the  Upanishads,  but  we  have  found 
our  Bible  in  the  writings  of  another  race;  it 
comes  to  us  not  through  Aryan  but  through 
Semitic  prophets  and  apostles.  And  I  know  not  ^ 
how  to  set  forth  the  supremacy,  the  vigor,  and 
the  predestined  universalism  of  the  Bible  so 
effectively  as  by  pointing  to  its  majestic  work 
in  moulding  the  English-speaking,  nationalities. 
In  the  American  Republic,  humanity,  according 
to  Professor  Bryce,  has  reached  the  highest 
level,  not  only  of  material  well-being,  but  of  in- 
telligence and  happiness  which  the  race  has  yet 
attained.'^  Within  a  hundred  years,  according  to 
Mr.  Lowell's  prophecy,  this  will  become  "the 
most  powerful  and  prosperous  community  ever 
devised  and  developed  by  man."  But  it  is  his- 
torically certain  that  America  was  "born  of  the 
Bible."  From  it  came,  in  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, the  strongest  impulses  which  colonized  her 
shores.  "Out  of  Biblical  precepts,  and  especially 
out  of  New  Testament  examples,  sprang  the 
simpler  forms  of  self-government  in  town  and 
church,  which  have  gone  with  civilization  in  its 
westward  march.  From  the  Bible  came  the 
Christian  teaching  which  exalted  man  above  the 
state.  From  it  came  the  observance  of  the 
Lord's  day,  the  bulwark  of  our  freedom,  "the 
core  of  our  civilization,"  and  from  it  came  the 
teaching  of  spiritual   truth   to  the  young,  which 


194    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

"has  done  more  to  preserve  liberty  than  grave 
statesmen  and  armed  soldiers."  The  Bible  was 
the  first  Book  which  the  types  of  Gutenberg  ever 
printed,  and  that  Book  is  the  foundation  of  the 
educational  system  of  the  New  World.  From  it 
came  its  public  schools,  and  more  than  three 
hundred  Christian  colleges,  stretching  from  the 
elms  of  Cambridge  to  the  great  lakes,  and  far 
over  prairie  and  mountain  to  where  "the  haunted 
waves  of  Asia  die  on  the  shore  of  the  world-wide 
sea."  From  the  Bible  came  the  better  elements 
of  our  national  institutions.  It  was  an  echo  of 
the  Scriptures  that  Jefferson  sounded  in  the 
teaching  that  all  men  are  created  equal  in  their 
right  to  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  life's  best 
good.  From  the  Bible  has  come  the  salt  of 
righteousness  which  has  thus  far  withstood  the 
wastings  of  corruption. 

In  America  has  the  Word  of  God  had  a  free 
field  for  its  divine  energies.  And  it  is  vastly 
significant,  and  the  fact  ought  to  be  blown  by 
trumpet-voices  to  the  ends  of  the  earth  that  the 
progress  of  Biblical  Christianity  in  America,  in 
spite  of  the  forces  of  materialism  and  the  sudden 
inrush  of  all  nationalities,  has  been  far  greater 
than  the  unparalleled  increase  of  population. 
Opening  the  pages  of  the  recent  national  census, 
we  learn  that  there  are  more  than  twenty  millions 
of  church  communicants  in  the  United  States  of 
America,  and  that  according  to  Dr.  Carroll,  the 
careful    superintendent    of    the     Department    of 


THE    UNIVERSAL   BOOK.  1 95 

Churches,  the  Christian  population  numbers 
nearly  fifty-seven  millions,  leaving  only  five  mil- 
lions belonging  to  the  non-religious  and  anti- 
religious  classes.  We  learn  that  while  the  popu- 
lation increased  twenty-four  per  cent,  between 
1880  and  1890,  the  communicants  in  the  churches 
increased  over  forty-two  per  cent.,  and,  as  in- 
dicating the  swifter  gowth  and  ampler  conquests 
of  those  churches  which  regard  the  Bible  as  a 
supernatural  revelation,  designed  to  be  authori- 
tative over  all  men,  may  be  mentioned  the  fact, 
that  the  evangelical  communicants  in  the  United 
States  are  to  the  non-evangelical  as  one  hundred 
and  three  to  one.  The  Church  in  America  "is 
devoted  to  the  temporal  and  eternal  interests  of 
mankind.  Every  corner-stone  it  lays,  it  lays 
for  humanity,  every  altar  it  establishes,  it  estab- 
lishes for  the  salvation  of  souls.  What  is  there 
in  the  world  to  compare  with  the  Church  in  its 
power  to  educate,  elevate  and  civilize  mankind?" 
Those  Christian  believers  who  hold  the  Bible 
in  their  hands  are  making  the  most  extensive 
conquests  to-day  in  the  field  which  is  the  world. 
The  victorious  march  of  a  Biblical  Christianity 
seems  predicted  by  such  signs  as  these :  that  the 
English  language  is  now  used  in  part  by  more 
than  one  hundred  millions  of  people,  that  the 
nations  speaking  the  Teutonic  tongues  are  in- 
,  creasing,  and  that  forty-two  million  square  miles 
of  the  land-surface  of  the  globe  are  to-day 
guarded  by  Christian  powers. 


196    CHRTSTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

No  movement  of  the  century  has  been  more 
significant  than  the  wide  extension  of  the  En- 
gHsh-speaking  peoples.  Christian  England  has 
not  failed  to  make  her  Biblical  faith  a  beneficent 
power  wherever  her  wide  commerce  has  ex- 
tended. When  we  go  beyond  the  British  Islands 
to  the  greater  Britain  of  her  colossal  possessions, 
and  watch  the  course  of  Christian  advance  in  the 
many  lands  over  which  waves  the  red-cross  flag; 
when  we  note  the  ample  domain  of  Canada,  the 
new  and  wondrous  world  of  Australia,  the  Eng- 
lish mission  stations  in  every  corner  of  the 
earth,  and  on  the  great  islands  of  the  sea ;  and 
especially  when  we  study  this  mighty  empire 
where,  during  the  Victorian  Era,  according  to 
Sir  Bartle  Frere,  the  "changes  have  been  more 
important  than  those  in  modern  Europe,"  we 
gain  a  new  impression  of  the  extent  of  that 
Biblical  dominion,  which  seems  likely  to  cover 
the  earth.®  It  is  certain  that  the  English-speak- 
ing nations  will  soon  control  the  destinies  of 
mankind.  England  has  seven  flourishing  states 
in  Africa;  and  who  can  doubt,  asks  John  Fiske, 
the  American  historian,  "that  the  African  Con- 
tinent will  be  occupied  by  a  mighty  nation  of 
English  descent,  covered  with  populous  cities 
and  flourishing  farms?"  He  points  to  New  Zea- 
land, "with  its  climate  of  perpetual  spring,  where 
the  English  race  is  multiplying  faster  than  any-« 
where   else    in    the  world,  unless   it    be   in  Texas 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  IV,  Note  6. 


THE    UNIVERSAL    BOOK.  1 97 

and  Minnesota."  In  a  century  and  a  half  the 
population  in  North  America  will  reach  seven 
hundred  millions.  English  colonies  will  occupy 
the  vast  Oceanic,  African,  Indian  worlds,  and 
the  day  is  at  hand  when  the  great  majority  of 
the  human  race  will  trace  their  pedigree  to  Eng- 
lish forefathers.  Are  not  these  tremendous 
facts  a  prophecy  that  the  coming  man  is  likely 
to  read  his  books,  not  in  two  hundred  languages, 
but  in  the  tongue  of  Bacon  and  Bunyan,  of 
Burke  and  Webster;  and  have  we  not  here  a 
prophecy,  confirmatory  of  all  else  that  we  have 
discovered,  that  the  coming  man  will  find  his 
sacred  literature  in  those  Scriptures  which  "prin- 
cipally teach  what  man  is  to  believe  concerning 
God  and  what  duty  God  requires  of  man?" 

When  Queen  Victoria,  on  the  fiftieth  anniver- 
sary of  her  coronation,  walked  the  aisles  of  West- 
minster Abbey,  she  crossed  the  grave  of  Living- 
stone, on  which  are  inscribed  the  words  of  Christ, 
"Other  sheep  I  have  which  are  not  of  this  fold." 
These  words  on  that  heroic  grave  are  surely  a 
sweet  great  prophecy  of  the  gathering  of  all  na- 
tions beneath  one  spiritual  banner.  Of  that 
majestic  kingdom  whose  outlines  already  appear, 
the  Universal  Book  is  the  harbinger,  symbol, 
and  moulding  power,  more  luminous,  attractive, 
and  divine,  than  our  present  imperfect  and 
divided  Christendom.  With  that  Book  we  go  to 
the  Moslem  and  recall  to  him  that  his  own  Koran 
pays  high  and  unstinted  homage   to  the  Old  and 


198    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

New  Testaments  as  the  Word  of  God.  With 
that  Book  we  shall  go  to  China,  and  holding  up 
a  standard  which  accords  with  her  best  political 
and  social  ideals,  shall  reveal  to  her  tough-fibered 
people  the  true  King  of  Heaven.  With  that 
Book  we  come  to  India,  and,  not  denying  her 
own  deepest  doctrine,  the  omnipenetrativeness 
of  the  Deity,  declare  the  God  who  was  in  Christ, 
the  incarnate  and  atoning  Redeemer,  reconciling 
the  world  unto  Himself.  With  that  Book  we 
shall  come  to  all  who  linger  in  the  twilight  of 
Asia,  and  flash  from  these  pages  the  Light  of 
the  World — until,  through  the  Universal  Book, 
men  shall  see  the  Universal  Man  and  Saviour, 
and  shall  be  brought  into  harmony  with  proph- 
ets, apostles,  martyrs,  who  have  kept  the  say- 
ings of  this  Book,  and  now  stand  robed  in  white, 
before  Him  whom  John  saw  with  vesture  dipped 
in  blood,  whose  name  is  called  The  Word  of 
God. 


THE  UNIVERSAL  MAN  AND  SAVIOUR. 


The  truth  of  the  Incarnation,  the  reality  of  the  intro- 
duction of  the  mind  of  God  into  the  world  in  the  conscious- 
ness of  Jesus,  is  the  creative  source  of  all  theology. — The 
Christ  of  To-day,  Gordon,  p.  175. 

Das  Hochste,  was  man  auf  diesem  Gebiete  denken 
kann,  ware  eine  menschliche  Personlichkeit,  welche  mit 
ihrem  ganzen  Wesen  und  Erleben  selbst  zum  vollen  und 
klaren  Ausdrucke  des  Willens  Gottes  mit  den  Menschen 
wiirde. — Christliche  Apologetik  von  Dr.  Herm.  Schultz, 
p.  21. 

The  confession  of  the  divinity  of  our  Lord  is  the  asser- 
tion that  all  the  scattered  rays  of  light  which  shine  in  the 
world  are  gathered  up  in  Him  and  radiate  from  Him  again. 
— The  World  as  the  Subject  of  Redemption,  W.  H.  Fre- 
mantle,  p.  22. 

We  may,  therefore,  say  that  the  basis  of  the  thought  of 
Jesus  is  the  consciousness  that  good  is  omnipotent;  that 
what  the  soul  of  man  recognizes  as  the  highest  ideal  is  at 
the  same  time  the  deepest  reality  of  the  world;  and  that 
man  is  not  merely  the  creature  but  the  son  of  God. — The 
Evolution  of  Religion,  Vol.  H,  p.  139,  Edward  Caird. 

But  it  is  only  of  One  that  we  know  that  he  united  the 
deepest  humility  and  a  purity  of  will  with  the  claim  that  He 
was  more  than  all  the  prophets  who  were  before  Him:  the 
Son  of  God.  Of  Him  alone  we  know  that  those  who  ate  and 
drank  with  Him,  glorified  Him  not  only  as  their  Teacher, 
Prophet  and  King,  but  also  as  the  Prince  of  Life,  as  the 
Redeemer  and  Judge  of  the  world. — Christianity  and  History, 
Adolf  Harnack,  p.  37. 


FIFTH    LECTURE. 

THE    UNIVERSAL    MAN   AND    SAVIOUR. 

I  am  simply  speaking  demonstrable  fact  when 
I  say  that  the  one  magnetic  center  in  the  world 
of  thought  and  religion  to-day  is  Jesus  Christ. 
This  course  of  Lectures  has  brought  us  to  a 
theme  before  which  I  might  well  keep  silent, 
acknowledging  what  I  profoundly  feel,  the  utter 
inadequacy  of  any  speech  which  I  am  able  to 
offer.  I  have  endeavored  to  set  forth  the  Uni- 
versal Aspects  of  Christianity,  as  indicating  its 
ultimate  universal  acceptance.  I  have  shown 
some  of  the  World-wide  Effects  of  Christianity, 
which  point  to  its  rightful  supremacy  and  world- 
wide prevalence.  We  have  seen  in  Christian 
Theism  a  basis  for  a  Universal  Religion,  and  have 
considered  together  the  Universal  Book.  It  is 
surely  appropriate  that  we  should  compare  Chris- 
tianity with  the  ethnic  and  the  would-be-uni- 
versal faiths.  It  is  appropriate,  also,  that  we 
should  place  the  Christian  Bible  by  the  side  of  the 
other  sacred  Scriptures.  But  we  advance  to-day 
a  step  further  and  a  step  higher.  Christendom 
is  great  and  wonderful,  but  Christ  is  infinitely 
greater.      Matched   with    Him,    the  best  golden 

20I 


202    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

acres  of  His  kingdom  are  as  moonlight  unto  sun- 
light. The  Bible  is  surpassingly  great,  but  He 
is  the  Light  which  flashes  from  its  pages.  He 
is  the  priceless  pearl  within  its  sacred  casket. 
The  Bible  has  well  been  called  only  "the  Chris- 
tian's score-book,  while  Christ  Himself  is  our 
song,  concrete,  vital,  expressive,  rhythmic,  uni- 
versal." And  while  we  may  compare  the  sacred 
books  of  the  world  with  each  other,  the  believer 
in  Christ  shrinks  back  almost  from  naming  his 
Saviour  and  King,  even  in  the  august  company 
of  the  founders  of  other  religions.  We  may 
compare  Moses,  Zoroaster,  Socrates,  Confucius, 
Buddha,  Mohammed,  among  themselves, and  with 
a  long  list  of  other  great  personages ;  but  when 
we  mention  before  a  company  of  Christians  the 
name  of  Jesus  Christ,  who  for  them  has  the 
spiritual  significance  of  God,  we  feel  that  wor- 
ship supplants  criticism  and  comparison,  and  that 
an  act  of  homage  in  praiseful  hymn  or  grateful 
prayer  is  the  first  commanding  duty. 

We  have  now  arrived  at  what  is  essential  in 
Christianity  and  what  is  most  distinctive.  Chris- 
tianity is  Christ.  More  and  more  it  is  identified 
with  its  Founder,  and  the  preservation  of  His 
life  as  the  supreme  historical  reality  is  the  final 
vindication  of  the  Christian  religion.  If  men  ask 
us  what  is  the  substance  of  the  Christian  belief, 
we  point  them  to  Christ,  as  predicted  by  the 
prophets,  as  disclosed  in  the  Gospels,  as  inter- 
preted  by  the    Epistles,  and   as   living   to-day  in 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  203 

the  hearts  of  His  people.  He  is  the  Alpha  and 
the  Omega,  the  beginning,  middle,  and  end  of 
Christian  faith.  To  the  believer  He  is  the  Mar- 
vel, the  Mystery,  the  Glory,  the  Explanation  of 
the  world,  standing  out  singular,  unique,  alone. 
He  sustains  the  most  opposite  characters  as  the 
Sufferer  and  the  Sovereign,  the  despised  of  men 
and  the  adored  of  angels,  the  Victim  and  the 
King,  the  Stone  of  Stumbling,  and  the  Bright 
and  Morning  Star,  the  Child  of  Mary,  the  Son 
of  God.  The  greatest  poetry  and  a  golden  treas- 
ury of  holy  hymns  have  been  laid  at  His  feet. 
There  is  no  form  or  degree  of  love  which  He  has 
not  touched.  Where  else  will  you  find  a  love 
which  covers  and  absorbs  the  whole  of  life  like 
that  which  Jesus  has  called  forth?  The  love 
which  is  born  of  gratitude  He  certainly  has  in- 
spired ;  the  love  which  is  linked  with  perfect 
admiration  He  surely  has  commanded;  the  love 
which  delights  to  pour  itself  out  in  lyric  ecstacy, 
the  love  which  is  filled  with  pitiful  sorrow  for 
great  suffering,  the  love  which  bows  in  adora- 
tion, the  love  which  inspires  men  to  endure  hard- 
ships, traverse  oceans,  brave  dangers  from  savage 
tribes  and  wasting  pestilence,  submit  to  shame 
and  despise  death  in  its  direst  forms:  all  these 
manifestations  of  love  appear  like  a  band  of  radi- 
ant angels  about  the  Christ.  This  love  to  Him 
has  given  joy  to  a  faith  which  persecution  could 
not  conquer  and  has  produced  those  tender  con- 
fidences between  the  soul  and   its   Saviour  which 


204    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

have  marked  the  Hves  of  some  of  the  wisest  and 
sweetest  of  our  race.  It  beat  with  strong  pulses 
through  the  mighty,  generous,  and  oft-burdened 
heart  of  Martin  Luther;  it  was  a  tender  under- 
song beneath  the  stern  hfe  and  iron  theology  of 
John  Calvin;  it  is  the  ever-burning  lamp  over- 
hanging the  feast  of  heaven  which  Thomas  a 
Kempis  sets  before  us  in  his  Imitation  of  Christ. 
The  great  epic  poet  of  England  was  sustained  by 
it  in  all  the  sorrows  that  covered  him,  and  it 
burns,  not  only  in  the  stately  grandeur  of  his 
poetry,  but  through  the  equal  majesty  of  his 
prose.  This  is  the  love  which  explains  the  joy 
of  the  missionary  and  the  martyr,  and  which 
forbade  and  prevented  the  betrayal  of  Jesus  in 
the  persecuted  Christian  of  Madagascar,  who 
saw  his  wife  and  brethren  and  children  bound 
and  thrown  down  the  rocks,  and  who  bravely 
followed  them  to  death  in  a  sublime  confession. 
This  love  gladdened  the  heart  of  the  all-accom- 
plished Van  der  Kemp  amid  the  degraded  Hot- 
tentots; it  moved  the  soul  of  Henry  Martyn  in 
his  life  of  heroic  sacrifice;  it  cheered  the  weary 
labors  of  the  American  scholars  who  gave  the 
Arabic  Bible  to  the  race  of  Mohammed ;  it  was 
the  inspiration  of  Neander,  as  with  incredible 
toil,  he  unrolled  anew  the  past  record  of  the 
Church ;  it  comforted  the  great  heart  of  Dorner 
as,  in  his  History  of  the  Doctrine  of  the  Person 
of  Christ,  he  traced  through  the  centuries  the 
manifold     and    majestic    impression    which     His 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  205 

august    personality  has  made    upon    men.      But 
while     He    enkindles     the      heart,      He    equally 
illumines    the    mind    of    the    believer,  who    per- 
ceives   in    Him    the  goal   of    prophecy  and  the 
turning   point    of    History.      In    Correggio's  pic- 
ture of   the    Infancy  the   light   streams   from  the 
face  of  the  new-born   King  in  the  lowly  stable, 
and    Christian    faith    beholds  in   it  the    light    of 
love   and    truth,    and    hope,     and    Messianic   ex- 
pectation that  illumined   the   sad   pathway  lead- 
ing the  exiles  of   Eden  out  of  the  lost  Paradise. 
It  was   the   radiance  which   brought    comfort   to 
the  Father  of  the  Faithful  in  the  supreme  moment 
of  his  life;   it  was  the  pillar  of  light  which  led 
Israel  out  of   Egypt ;  it  was  the  gleam  of  hope 
which   shone   amid   the   altar  fires   of   tabernacle 
and  temple ;   it  was  the  splendor  which  appeared 
on   the   breast-plate   of  Aaron,  the   high   priest, 
and   the   crown   of   David,  the   king;  it  was   the 
stellar  glory  which  illumined  the  souls  of   proph- 
ets, becoming  at  last  the  rounded  fullness  of  the 
Sun   of   Righteousness;  it  was   the   light  which, 
five    centuries    before     Bethlehem    cradled    the 
King,  had  illumined  the  soul  of  the  Indian  prince 
Siddartha,    who    may    be    classed    among    those 
prophets  that  dimly  saw  what  was  yet  to  fill  all 
the  world  with  its  gracious  illumination. 

And  Christian  faith  has  seen,  in  the  coming  of 
the  Christ,  the  starting-point  of  the  world's 
greater  history.  He  appeared  at  a  time  when 
peace  covered  the  nations,  and  there  seemed  to 


3o6    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

be  a  pause    in  the  on-goings  of   humanity,  when 
His    own    people  were    helpless    and    craving    a 
Deliverer,   smitten  from  without  and  torn  from 
within.       They   had    scattered   their   synagogues 
over  the  Roman   Empire,  little  dreaming  that  in 
them  the  messengers  of   Jesus   of   Nazareth  were 
to  find  their  first  listeners   to   the   glad  tidings  of 
a  Messiah  come.      As   little   did  the  Romans  im- 
agine  that   along   the   military  roads  which   they 
had    stretched    from   land   to   land,  the  ambassa- 
dors of  the  Prince  of  the  House  of  David  were  to 
herald    a   new    Kingdom,    which    should    eclipse 
and   outlast  the  monarchy  of  the   Caesars.      Just 
as  little  did  the  disciples  of  Greek  learning,  who 
in   that   age  were  found   in  all    the  great  cities 
of   the    East,  dream    that    their   language  was  to 
be  the  vehicle  of  a  literature  coming  from  Judea, 
which  was  to   rival  the  riches  of   their   own  phi- 
losophers, and  was  to   ultimately  become  intelli- 
gible and  life-giving  to   a  thousand  tribes  of  the 
children    of   men;  a   literature  to   which    all   the 
chief  intellectual  luminaries  of  eighteen  hundred 
years    should    repair,    from    its    founts    of    holy 
splendor   filling  their   golden    urns.       "Speaking 
the  tongue  of   Homer  and  of  Plato,  the  Jewish 
preachers   of  a   universal   Christian  Redemption, 
made  their  way  along  the   undeviating   roads  by 
which  the  Roman   legionaries  had  made  straight 
in  the   desert   a  highway  for  our  God."      There 
are  no   accidents   in   history.      A  wondrous  time 
matched  and    fitted   the   coming  of   Him  who  is 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  207 

the  wonder  of  all  time.  Standing  to-day  in  His 
light  which  streams  all  around  us,  we  feel 
that  no  mortal  can  with  Him  compare  among 
the  sons  of  men.  He  sustains  different  relations 
to  the  Christian  spirit  from  those  sustained  by 
the  founders  of  other  religions  to  their  disciples. 
Men  who  are  guilt-smitten  and  tortured  with 
agony,  are  quieted  and  transformed  by  His 
Name  and  Word.  Moses  never  stood,  or 
claimed  to  stand,  on  any  celestial  height.  Bud- 
dha and  Confucius  may  be  ranked  with  saints 
and  sages,  and  Mohammed  may  be  deemed  a 
prophet  who  clearly  saw  the  unity  of  God,  but 
the  world,  as  it  seems  to  the  Christian,  has  only 
one  Saviour,  who  brings  the  same  hopes,  fashions 
the  same  characters,  commands  the  same  grateful 
homage  among  nations  as  remote  from  each 
other  as  the  Greenlanders  and  the  native  Aus- 
tralians, the  dwellers  by  the  Oregon  and  the 
dwellers  by  the  Ganges;  as  distant  in  time  as 
those  who  assembled  in  an  upper  room  in  old 
Jerusalem  from  those  who  sing  His  praises  to- 
day in  stately  cathedrals  or  the  barracks  of  the 
Salvation  Army. 

We  may  say  of  Him,  that  He  is  the  strength 
and  substance  of  the  religion  bearing  His  name. 
We  cannot  say  of  Mohammedanism  that  it  is 
Mohammed,  though  he  is  certainly  a  part  of  it, 
the  temporary  strength,  and,  as  we  believe,  the 
ultimate  disintegration  of  it  as  a  system.  We 
cannot  say  of  Buddhism  that  it  is  Gautama  Bud- 


2o8    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

dha,  for  not  only  does  that  protean  faith  recog- 
nize many  Buddhas,  but  even  in  the  beginning 
it  was  "Nirvana  and  the  Law,"  rather  than  the 
gentle  saint  himself  that  his  loving  disciples 
preached.  Hinduism  is  associated  with  the 
names  of  poets,  saints,  reformers,  none  of  them 
supreme  and  all-inclusive.  We  cannot  say  of 
Confucianism  that  it  is  Confucius,  for  the 
Chinese  sage  was  a  scribe  and  historian  of  the 
ancients,  a  transmitter,  and  not  a  creator.  While 
he  represents  China,  and  is  venerated  by  millions, 
and  while  temples  are  dedicated  and  sandal-wood 
papers  are  burned  to  him  in  every  Chinese  city, 
he  is  the  symbol  rather  than  the  ever-living  em- 
bodiment of  the  faith  which  he  taught.  But  in 
Jesus  Christ  His  followers  find  the  truth  person- 
alized, knowing  whom  they  know  God,  man, 
atonement,  resurrection,  redemption,  immor- 
tality. Our  creed  is  not  merely  Christ's  sermons 
and  parables,  not  merely  what  Jesus  said,  but 
also  what  He  was  and  did.  The  teaching  of 
Christ,  which  is  adequate,  holds  up  His  radiant 
person,  sets  forth  His  matchless  utterances,  and 
relates  the  story  of  His  life,  death,  and  resurrec- 
tion; it  proclaims  what  Jesus  was,  what  Jesus 
said,  what  Jesus  did.  In  the  first  we  have 
theology,  in  the  second  we  have  ethics,  in  the 
third  we  have  the  Gospel,  and  in  all  together  we 
have  salvation  for  the  individual  and  for  man- 
kind. He  is  the  living  embodied  truth,  the 
knowledge  of  whom   is  eternal  life.      Men  have 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  209 

formulated  masterly  statements  regarding  Him, 
but  He  is  larger  than  our  creeds,  and  He  has 
the  life-giving  quality  possessed  by  no  formula 
however  true.  Such,  according  to  Christian 
faith,  is  the  personality  whom  I  shall  endeavor 
to  set  forth  as  the  universal  Man  and  Saviour. 

That  Christianity  is  the  World-Religion  has 
been  argued  in  the  previous  lectures  on  the 
various  grounds  on  which  thus  far  we  have 
stood.  But  now  I  summon  your  thought  to  the 
claim  that  Christianity  alone  presents  in  its 
Founder  and  Central  Personage  the  Universal 
Man  and  Redeemer,  who  meets  at  once  the 
need,  the  temper,  the  intellectual  and  the  spir- 
itual demands  of  all  peoples.  He  rules,  as  we 
know,  the  occidental  nations,  but  He  is  no  more 
occidental  than  oriental;  the  East  may  claim 
him  as  well  as  the  West.  We  remember  how 
Keshub  Chunder  Sen,  in  his  lectures,  rejoiced 
that  Jesus  Christ  was  an  Asiatic,  that  His  dis- 
ciples were  Asiatics,  that  all  the  agencies  pri- 
marily employed  for  the  propagation  of  the  Gos- 
pel were  Asiatic,  that  "in  Christ  we  see  not  only 
the  exaltedness  of  humanity,  but  also  the  grand- 
eur of  which  Asiatic  nature  is  susceptible.'  "And 
we  remember  with  what  beautiful  and  loving 
sentences  Mozoomdar  has  pictured  the  oriental 
Christ,  the  bathing,  fasting,  praying,  teaching, 
healing,  feasting,  Prophet  of  Nazareth.  When 
Jesus  is  received   into   the   heart,  He  is  as  much 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  V,  Note  i. 


2IO    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

at  home  in  the  Universities  by  the  Ganges  as  in 
those  by  the  Isis  and  the  Cam,  in  the  cities  by 
the  Indus  and  the  Nile,  as  in  those  by  the  Hud- 
son and  the  Clyde.  We  cannot  think  of  a  west- 
ern Mohammed.  We  can  hardly  think  of  a 
western  Buddha,  but  you  discover  nothing  local 
or  provincial  about  Jesus  Christ.  It  makes  not 
the  least  difference  where  men  preach  His  Gos- 
pel: to  the  most  cultivated  Europeans  or  the 
most  barbarous  Africans,  to  the  thoughtful 
Hindus  or  to  the  North  American  savages, 
among  the  naked  Hottentots  or  among  the  fur- 
clad  Esquimaux;  He  finds  a  true  home  in  the 
hearts  of  all  who  receive  Him  because  He  is  the 
Universal  Man,  and  even  the  three  hundred 
names  given  Him  in  the  Scriptures  do  not  ex- 
haust His  million-sided  personality. 

We  know  very  well  that  such  a  complex  being 
as  man  requires  a  Saviour  and  Leader  who  shall 
answer  to  all  his  intellectual  and  moral  needs. 
The  Teuton  requires  a  captain,  a  hero,  in  whom 
is  every  quality  of  heroic  manliness  and  splendid 
leadership.  The  Asiatic  demands  a  reasoner,  an 
expounder  of  abstract  truth  who  can  formulate 
universal  principles.  Men  whose  minds  are 
Greek  in  their  intellectual  aptitudes  cannot  be 
satisfied  with  a  teacher  who  is  not  analytic,  and 
I  may  add  Socratic,  in  his  methods.  And  there 
are  poets  in  the  world,  in  whom  imagination  is 
the  central  light  of  the  soul,  who  commune  with 
nature    because    they  see    in    the   outer  world    a 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  211 

reflex  both  of  humanity  and  of  divinity.  Further- 
more, most  that  is  good  in  human  life  is  found 
in  the  family,  in  society,  and  the  world  needs  a 
prophet  who  shall  be  familiar  and  friendly  and 
sympathetic,  who  shall  bless  the  little  children, 
and  share  the  wedding  feast,  and  stand  with 
tear-wet  eyes  at  the  open  grave.  The  most 
familiar  character  on  the  stage  of  human  life  is 
the  sufferer,  who  is  conscious  of  sin  and  who  is 
smitten  with  grief,  and  the  perfect  Man  and 
Saviour  must  meet  his  innermost  need.  Christ 
alone  is  adequate  to  all  these  demands. 

As  we  open  the  Gospels,  and  read  the  Avords 
of  Jesus  therein  recorded,  we  discover  in  them  a 
body  of  wisdom,  the  loftiest  in  spirit,  the  most 
astonishing  in  their  completeness,  and  the 
calmest  in  their  absolute  assurance  of  authority 
which  the  world  possesses.  These  words  fell 
from  the  lips  of  Jesus  talking  with  fishermen, 
soldiers,  women,  Pharisees;  and  they  seem  the 
natural  and  easy  expressions  of  One  who  was 
Himself  greater  than  what  He  said,  flakes  of 
gold  crumbling  off  from  their  very  richness, 
sparks  struck  out  by  His  contacts  with  men, 
snowy  petals  shaken  by  the  breezes  of  discussion 
from  the  blossoming  boughs  of  the  tree  of  life, 
with  a  naturalness  and  ease  like  that  of  a  virgin 
prairie  covering  itself  in  May-time  with  grass 
and  flowers.  A  lawyer,  feeling  ill  at  ease  by 
the  reply  of  Jesus  to  his  question,  put  to  Him 
the  inquiry,  "Who   is   my  neighbor?"      And   in- 


212    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

stantly  came  forth  from  the  lips  of  Christ  the 
parable  of  the  good  Samaritan,  and  all  literature 
furnishes  nothing  equal  to  this  extemporised 
allegory  by  which  Jesus  rebuked  the  Pharisaic 
and  cruel  hypocrisy  of  His  time  and  identified 
His  cause  with  the  most  gracious  humanities  of 
all  the  future.  No  Hindu  sage,  or  Greek 
logician,  or  Hebrew  prophet,  could  possibly 
crave  anything  keener,  more  searching,  more 
humbling,  more  inspiring.  It  illustrates  a 
method  of  teaching  that  can  never  be  provincial 
and  can  never  become  obsolete.  This  is  one  of 
those  amazing  parables  by  which  He,  who  is 
confessedly  the  greatest  of  Teachers,  brought 
His  message  home  to  the  common,  the  universal 
mind.  Whoever  taught  like  this  man?  The 
simple,  sublime,  picturesque  pedagogy  of  the 
Gospels  has  evoked  the  enthusiasm  of  the  chief 
instructors  of  the  race. 

In  our  Christian  libraries  we  point  to  the 
wealth  of  sermonic  literature  which  has  been 
worth  preserving,  and  which  has  been  inspired 
by  the  Christ:  the  works  of  South  and  Jeremy 
Taylor,  and  Bunyan,  and  Whitfield,  and  Chal- 
mers, of  Robert  Hall  and  Robertson,  of  Bush- 
nell,  and  Spurgeon,  and  we  say,  "From  these 
tomes  we  will  show  you  miracles  of  eloquence 
and  wisdom  which  you  cannot  rival  in  the  mas- 
terpieces of  the  Senate  and  the  Forum."  But 
we  who  know  the  Christ,  would  no  more  think 
of    comparing    the    best    speeches    of    Cicero   or 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  21 3 

Burke  with  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  than  we 
should  of  comparing  the  fine  jewehy  of  a  king's 
diadem  with  the  unwasting  fires  of  the  Milky- 
Way.  The  printed  sayings  of  Christ  you  can 
read  in  an  hour,  and  if  you  ever  take  pains  to 
go  over  them  thoughtfully  at  one  sittting,  you 
may  feel  like  a  man  permitted  in  some  ethereal 
body  to  step  from  burning  constellation  to  burn- 
ing constellation,  round  the  whole  infinite  breadth 
of  the  Zodiac. 

But  remember  that  the  conversations  of 
Jesus,  containing  all  this  wisdom,  are  not  the 
hard-wrought  elaborations  which  scholars  admire 
in  Walter  Savage  Landor;  they  are  not  the  rea- 
sonings of  the  philosopher,  collating,  as  Sir  Wil- 
liam Hamilton  did,  the  opinions  of  a  thousand 
thinkers  in  a  half  score  of  languages,  and  slowly 
digesting  the  vast  materials  before  offering  the 
labored  result  to  the  criticism  of  mankind.  They 
were  spoken  with  the  familiarity  of  the  break- 
fast table,  and  yet  with  the  authority  of  Mount 
Sinai.  The  free  utterances  of  this  Nazarene 
Prophet  do  not  recall  the  frenzy  of  Elijah  nor 
the  ardor  of  Isaiah,  who  appear  to  us  lifted  by  a 
divine  breath  greater  than  themselves.  Still  less 
do  they  remind  us  of  the  experiences  of  Mo- 
hammed, whose  nervous  system  was  overstrained, 
and  whose  struggles  and  agonies  were  accom- 
panied by  delusions  of  the  senses,  before  he  came 
out  into  the  calm  assurance  that  he  was  a  divine 
messenger    commissioned    to    utter    one    specific 


2  14    CHRISTIANITT,   THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

truth.  Nor  does  Jesus  remind  us  of  Buddha, 
who,  after  long  years  of  vain  search,  and  many 
agonizing  disappointments,  at  last  gained  the 
vision  by  which  his  life  was  thereafter  attended. 
There  is  in  Jesus  a  divine,  self-contained  calm- 
ness and  sweet  authority  distinguishing  Him 
from  all  others.  And  we  find  in  Him,  not  what 
we  discover  in  Aristotle  and  John  Stuart  Mill, 
thought  and  language  welded  together  through 
disciplined  thinking,  for  Jesus  speaks  rather  with 
the  fine  free  utterance  of  the  poet  whose  vision 
of  God  is  unclouded. 

If  all  men  need  a  perfect  teacher,  one  who  has 
a  perfect  message  which  grows  not  antiquated, 
where  else  shall  they  discover  him?^  Does  not 
Jesus  meet  the  mental  and  spiritual  needs  of 
humanity  both  by  the  contents  of  His  disclosure 
and  the  method  of  His  speech?  Let  no  one  be 
eager  to  mention  Buddha  as  a  possible  rival,  for 
Buddha  was  blind  to  that  truth  which  glowed 
ever  in  the  heart  of  Christ,  the  Fatherhood  of 
God,  And  Jesus  not  only  taught  the  divine 
Fatherhood,  but  He  made  God  real  to  men,  not 
merely  by  words  spoken  about  God,  but  by  tak- 
ing the  veil,  as  it  were,  from  the  face  of  the 
Father,  and  showing  us  God  in  Himself.  He 
taught  that  obedience  is  the  one  principle  in  the 
universe  which  makes  for  life  and  peace;  He 
taught  that  men  must  get  into  harmony  with  the 
moral  law.      So   far  as  his  teaching  was  ethical, 

^Appendix,  Lecture  V,  Note  2. 


THE    UNIVERSAL    MAN.  215 

it  reached  down  to  the  centre  of  human  char- 
acter, demanding  truth  in  the  inner  parts,  not 
compromising  with  any  darHng  sin,  as  did  Mo- 
hammed, leaving  us  satisfied  with  no  fragmentary 
virtues,  as  Confucius  did ;  and  confessing  no 
agnosticism  with  regard  to  the  power  that  rules 
in  heaven;  exalting  humility,  enthroning  meek- 
ness, laying  its  benedictory  hand  on  aspirations 
after  holiness,  holding  out  promises  to  the  mer- 
ciful ;  placing  a  diadem  on  the  spirit  of  martyr- 
dom, searching  out  the  hiding  places  of  the 
hypocrite,  rebuking  the  spirit  of  display  in  alms- 
giving and  the  habit  of  meaningless  repetition  in 
prayer,  lifting  the  earthly  life  heavenward,  teach- 
ing a  supreme  trust  in  the  Father's  goodness  and 
personal  care,  magnifying  the  duty  of  brotherly 
kindness  on  earth,  and  yet  pointing  to  rewards 
and  sufferings  in  the  life  beyond  as  supreme 
objects  of  human  thought  and  fear. 

Think  of  the  pulpits  in  which  Christ  spoke, 
and  gain  a  new  sense  of  His  adaptations  to  all 
human  life.  To  no  seated  congregation,  under 
no  one  roof,  were  His  divine  discourses  given  to 
men.  He  seized  the  occasions  as  they  came  to 
Him,  now  on  the  sea-beach  of  Gennesareth,  call- 
ing His  chosen  disciples  or  instructing  the  multi- 
tude in  a  series  of  matchless  parables;  now  at 
Jacob's  Well,  conversing  with  an  audience  of 
one,  and  pouring  into  her  mind  the  heavenliest 
truths  concerning  the  Father's  nature  and  the 
obligations    of    spiritual   worship ;     now    on    the 


2l6    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

mountain-top  of  Galilee,  with  the  blue  sky  for  a 
dome,  the  green  earth  for  a  carpet,  and  a  mixed 
multitude  for  an  audience,  breathing  over  the 
attentive  crowd  such  syllables  of  wisdom  and 
tenderness  as  grateful  hearts  could  not  let  die; 
now  opening  the  Scriptures  in  the  synagogues  of 
Nazareth  or  Capernaum ;  now  standing  in  the 
courts  of  the  temple  and  calling  day  after  day 
to  the  multitudes  at  the  feast  of  tabernacles; 
"If  any  man  thirst,  let  him  come  unto  Me  and 
drink;"  now  speaking  at  the  tomb  of  Lazarus 
those  words  which  have  enhghtened  the  dark- 
ness of  the  grave;  and,  at  last  making  a  pulpit 
of  His  own  cross  of  agony,  from  which  His 
seven-fold  utterances  have  floated  down  through 
time,  to  reveal  to  men  His  forgiving  love,  His 
filial  affection,  His  entire  humanity,  the  pain  of 
His  atoning  sacrifice,  and  the  completion  of  His 
atoning  work. 

The  words  which  He  spake,  into  whatever 
lands  they  have  gone,  are  still  spirit  and  life. 
Our  hungry  minds  find  in  Him  a  truth  which  is 
not  a  geometric  proposition,  a  grammatical  rule, 
a  philosophical  statement,  a  historical  fact,  or  a 
scientific  principle,  but  is  truth  ethical,  person- 
alized, spiritual,  radiant  with  divine  light  and 
love.  The  Beatitudes,  pondered  daily  and  heard 
in  the  silence  of  the  spirit  as  the  voice  of  Jesus 
speaking  to  us;  the  parable  of  the  Lost  Sheep; 
the  story  of  the  Lost  Son ;  the  blessed  invitation 
"Come  unto  Me";   the  promises  of   eternal  life; 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  21'J 

the  words  of  ringing  cheer,  which  stih  sound  to 
His  disciples  hke  a  mellow  blast  from  an  arch- 
angel's trumpet;  the  solemn  parables  of  the  final 
judgment;  His  sentences  of  inspiring  command, 
bidding  us  go  out  of  ourselves  and  tell  the  entire 
world  about  Him :  these,  taken  home  into  the 
mind  and  conscience  and  affection,  are  still 
celestial  food  to  the  soul.  Nurses  in  the  hos- 
pital, like  Dora  Pattison,  soldiers  like  Chinese 
Gordon  on  the  eve  of  battle,  girls  at  school  learn- 
ing of  sickness  and  sorrow  at  home,  mothers 
looking  into  the  cradles  or  cofBns  of  infant  chil- 
dren, tired  men  of  business  harassed  with  cares, 
scholars  grown  weary  of  the  world  of  books,  re- 
formers beset  by  angry  wickedness,  Christian 
preachers  amid  the  suffering  and  crime  of  dark 
cities,  have  thus  been  made  strong  by  com- 
munion with  Jesus.  And  many  of  us  will  for- 
give Matthew  Arnold  for  much  imperfect  and 
even  ignoble  criticism  of  the  Church  and  the 
Bible,  as  we  read  again  that  best  of  his  sonnets 
"East  London,"  which  seems  to  have  been  in- 
spired by  the  spoken  words  of  Christ : — 

"  'Twas  August,  and  the  fierce  sun  overhead 
Smote  on  the  squalid  streets  of  Bethnal  Green, 
And  the  pale  weaver,  through  his  window  seen 
In  Spitalfields,  look'd  thrice  dispirited. 
I  met  a  preacher  there  I  knew,  and  said: 
'111  and  o'erworked,  how  fare  you  in  this  scene?' 
'  Bravely!"  said  he,  "  for  I  of  late  have  been 
Much  cheered  with  thoughts  of  Christ  the  living  bread.' 
O  human  soul,  as  long  as  thou  canst  so 
Set  up  a  mark  of  everlasting  light 


2l8    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Above  the  howling  senses'  ebb  and  flow, 

To  cheer  thee,  and  to  right  thee  if  thou  roam. 

Not  with  lost  toil  thou  labourest  through  the  night; 

Thou  mak'st  the  Heaven  thou  hop'st  indeed  thy  home." 

But  when  we  rise  above  the  qualities  of  Jesus 
as  a  teacher,  and  approach  His  moral  nature,  we 
have  no  apologies  to  offer  like  those  with  which 
Mohammedan  scholars  are  obliged  to  defend  the 
Arabian  prophet.  We  have  no  limitations  to 
concede,  like  the  Israelite  in  his  panegyric  of 
Moses.  We  discover  in  Christ  absolute  freedom 
from  the  consciousness  of  sin,  and  stainless  purity 
in  an  age  when  society  was  corrupt  at  both  ends, 
when  license  and  cruelty  ruled  in  the  multitude, 
and  hypocritic  formalism  in  the  spiritual  aris- 
tocracy of  Judaism.  He  stands  on  a  moral  height 
quite  above  anything  which  other  religions  have 
to  offer.  "He  stands  as  high  above  us  as  He 
did  above  His  first  disciples — a  perfect  Master, 
the  supreme  head  of  the  fellowship  of  all  true 
religion."  I  often  think  the  greatest  theological 
discovery  of  our  generation,  has  been  Jesus  the 
Christ,  by  which  I  mean  that  many  obstructions 
have  been  removed,  many  obscurities  have 
been  wiped  away  from  the  first  Christian  cen- 
tury, and  some  theological  and  other  clouds  have 
been  dispelled,  so  that  He  stands  above  us  in 
His  solitary  pre-eminence  as  perhaps  He  was 
never  presented  before  to  the  minds  of  men. 
"He  leads  captive  the  civilized  peoples;  they 
accept  His  word  as  law,  though  they  confess  it  a 
law  higher    than    human    nature    likes  to  obey; 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  219 

they  build  Him  churches,  they  worship  Him, 
they  praise  Him  in  songs,  interpret  Him  in  phi- 
losophies and  theologies;  and  they  deeply  love 
for  His  sake." 

The  tide  of  humanity,  even  according  to  the 
confessions  of  those  who  have  striven  to  pluck 
from  Him  the  crown  of  His  divinity,  has  not 
since  risen  so  high  as  it  rose  in  Jesus  Christ. 
"All  admit,  and  joyfully  admit,"  said  Channing, 
"that  Jesus,  by  His  greatness  and  goodness, 
throws  all  other  human  attainments  into  ob- 
scurity." And  even  Strauss  confessed  of  Him: 
"He  remains  the  highest  model  of  religion 
within  the  reach  of  our  thought ;  and  no  per- 
fect piety  is  possible  without  His  presence  in  the 
heart."  Theodore  Parker  realized  that  no 
church  has  yet  mastered  His  conceptions  and 
fully  comprehended  and  applied  His  methods. 
Now,  I  ask,  does  not  human  nature  need  a  moral 
hero  in  whom  men  can  implicitly  trust,  to  whom 
they  can  give  unreserved  devotion,  and  who  is 
an  ever-living  presence  and  power?  "Leadership 
was  natural  to  Jesus.  To  make  disciples  He 
needed  only  to  say,  'Follow  me!'  His  will  was 
resistless.  Enemies  could  not  override  Him, 
Satan  could  not  baffle  Him,  Death  itself  could 
not  defeat  Him.  No  experience,  coming  ever 
so  suddenly,  could  disturb  His  balanced  equi- 
poise. Standing  alone  against  the  world,  there 
was  majesty  and  supremacy  in  every  attitude 
and  aspect  of  His  life." 


2  20    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

I  grant  joyfully  that  there  have  been  with 
many  an  immense  inspiration  and  fascination  in 
the  personality  of  Gautama  Buddha,  in  his  self- 
sacrifice  and  gentleness,  his  calm  wisdom,  his 
long  life  of  devotion.  Like  Confucius,  he 
reached  more  than  four-score  years.  We  may 
agree  with  St.  Hilaire  that,  excepting  Christ 
only,  there  is  no  figure  among  the  founders  of 
religions  more  pure  and  touching  than  his.  But 
who  will  say  that  Buddha  is  either  proclaimed  or 
believed  in  as  a  personal,  inspiring  presence  now 
among  the  millions  of  Asia?  "We  are  touching 
on  no  disputed  point,  when  we  assert  that 
according  to  the  Buddhist  Scriptures  the  per- 
sonal, conscious  life  of  the  founder  of  that 
religion  was  extinguished  in  death."  Wliile  I 
am  grateful  for  the  sweet  spirit  of  him  who 
threw  away  the  splendors  of  royalty  and  traveled 
through  India  as  a  beggar,  and  did  not  shrink 
from  the  companionship  of  the  poorest;  while  I 
bless  God  for  the  noble  example  of  one  who 
gave  himself  to  the  service  of  others,  and  who, 
I  believe,  will  be  numbered  among  those  who, 
as  Jesus  said,  "shall  come  from  the  east  to  sit 
down  in  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven,"  still  I  know 
that  Buddha  is  gone,  and  that  no  voice  comes 
from  him  to  the  millions  revering  his  name. 
But  He  who  marches  at  the  head  of  Christen- 
dom, travailing  in  the  greatness  of  His  strength 
is,  according  to   Christian   faith,  and  I  may  add, 


THE    UNIVERSAL  MAN.  22 1 

Christian  experience,  the  living  Christ,  "the 
same  yesterday,  to-day,  and  forever." 

And  He  only,  among  all  historic  characters, 
can  justly  be  said  to  have  lived  with  no  con- 
sciousness of  moral  unworthiness.  When  we 
consider  the  weakness  and  wickedness  of  human 
life,  recall  the  universality  of  sin,  reflect  that  no 
week  passes  with  us,  even  wlien  we  are  striving 
with  the  utmost  prayerfulness  after  the  highest, 
that  we  do  not  fall  below  our  ideal;  when  we 
consider  what  a  record  of  imperfection,  of  one- 
sided development,  of  unbalanced  attainment, 
is  every  human  career  that  we  know;  when  we 
remember  how  conscious  of  personal  sinfulness 
the  purest  men  have  always  been ;  when  we  see 
such  natures  as  those  of  Pascal  and  Jonathan 
Edwards  scanning  with  angelic  insight  the  Law  of 
God,  and  trembling  like  an  electrometer  in  a  thun- 
der-storm, the  moral  wonder  of  this  Galilean 
Peasant,  who  never  uttered  a  prayer  for  forgive- 
ness, who  never  betrayed  the  faintest  conscious- 
ness of  imperfection  or  moral  demerit,  becomes 
more  and  more  astounding. 

His  freedom  from  sin  was  apparently  not  the 
result  of  prolonged  and  painful  effort;  His  vir- 
tues were  not  like  ours,  the  hard  and  finished 
products  of  discipline,  restraint,  asceticism,  and 
sorrowful  experience.  We  rise  "on  stepping- 
stones  of  our  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 
We   advance,   as   Paul   did,  by  resolutely  forget- 


2  23     CHRISTTANrrr,   THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

ting  the  errors  and  follies  of  the  past,  and  press- 
ing with  heroic  determination  onward  toward  the 
higher  goal;  but  with  Jesus  we  find  no  tears  of 
penitence,  no  prayers  for  pardon,  no  betrayal  of 
any  suspicion  of  error  or  iniquity,  for  the  past 
was  never  to  Him  a  time  for  forgetfulness,  but 
only  for  delightful  remembrance.  The  Gospels 
give  us  one  glimpse  of  it  in  the  glory  He  had 
with  the  Father  before  the  world  was.  "The 
most  perfect  unity  reigns  in  His  life;  He  ad- 
vances according  to  the  circumstances  in  which 
He  lived,  but  His  change  produces  in  Him  no 
change  in  character  or  design ;  everywhere  he  is 
animated  by  the  same  spirit."  How  different 
with  Mohammed  before  and  after  his  agonizing 
experiences  in  the  cave  and  desert,  and  how 
different  with  Gautama  Buddha  before  and  after 
his  great  enlightenment  beneath  the  Bo-tree  in 
Gaya! 

Without  self-seeking,  in  the  age  of  Augustus 
and  Tiberius  Caesar;  without  the  least  taint  of 
sensuality,  when  the  world  reeked  with  corrup- 
tion;  without  falsehood,  shortly  before  the 
Stoic  emperor,  Marcus  Aurelius,  declared  that 
truth  had  taken  flight  from  the  earth ;  without 
injustice,  in  the  midst  of  a  Jewish  legislation 
which,  as  perverted,  defended  many  kinds  of 
cruel  inequality;  unique  not  only  when  com- 
pared with  all  that  went  before,  but  when  com- 
pared with  all  that  followed  Him;  manifestly  in 
all  things  as  R^nan  confessed,  "superior  to  His 


THE    UNIVERSAL  MAN.  223 

disciples  and  not  created  by  them;"  on  the  one 
side  of  Him  appearing  John  the  Baptist,  wlio 
declared  himself  unworthy  to  unloose  His  san- 
dals; and  on  the  other  side  of  Him  the  greatest 
of  apostles,  claiming  nothing  except  what  he  ob- 
tained from  Christ ;  on  the  one  side  of  Him  in 
heathenism  appearing  the  orator  and  statesman 
Cicero,  declaring  that  a  perfect  sage  he  had 
never  found,  and  on  the  other  side  the  phi- 
losopher Seneca,  who  mournfully  affirmed  that 
innocence  had  fled  away  from  the  earth ;  there 
rises  in  the  midst  of  them  all  this  young  vil- 
lager, this  incomparable  man,  this  "purest 
among  the  mighty,  and  mightiest  among  the 
pure,"  whose  pierced  hand,  as  Paul  Richter 
said,  "has  lifted  empires  from  their  foundations 
and  turned  the  stream  of  history  from  its  old 
channels,"  and  for  whom,  as  the  sagacious  Na- 
poleon, whose  brain  Victor  Hugo  called  "the 
cube  of  the  human  intellect,"  once  affirmed, 
"millions  were  now  ready  to  die." 

But  Jesus  appears  to  us  not  only  completely 
innocent,  as  His  friends  and  enemies  affirmed — 
Xenophon  said  of  Socrates  that  he  was  without 
impiety — but  positively  and  completely  holy. 
The  crystal  goblet  was  not  only  stainless,  it  was 
also  filled  with  the  wine  of  absolute  goodness. 
His  moral  teaching  was  perfect,  and  was  per- 
fectly illustrated  in  His  own  life,  thus  contrast- 
ing with  us,  and  contrasting  with  the  best  of  the 
prophets  and   saints  whose  confession  so  often  is 


224    CHRISTIANITV,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

that  of  the  Roman  poet,  "I  see  and  approve  the 
better  and  I  follow  the  worse."  He  saw,  ap- 
proved, followed  the  absolute  best.  Moses  was, 
perhaps,  the  greatest  of  all  the  sons  of  men,  and 
his  was  a  noble  nature,  but  he  was  conscious  of 
weakness,  full  of  mistakes,  acknowledged  his 
sins,  and  was  punished  for  his  sins;  he  was  both 
rash  and  self-distrustful,  hasty  in  the  beginning, 
going  before  he  was  sent,  and  his  presumption  or 
his  distrust  of  God  was  so  offensive  on  one  occa- 
sion, that  he  was  forbidden  to  enter  the  Land  of 
Promise.  Moses  prayed  as  a  sinner,  and  shed 
tears  of  sorrow  for  himself,  as  well  as  for  his  peo- 
ple. Great  and  splendid  were  his  virtues,  but 
compared  with  those  of  Christ,  they  seem  like 
stars  that  peep  through  the  clouds  here  and  there 
in  a  darkened  sky,  instead  of  the  unveiled  and 
spotless  heavens,  lighted  with  the  glory  of  all 
the  constellations.  Moses  struggled  from  below 
upwards.  Jesus  appears  to  descend  from  a 
higher  sphere,  and  to  shed  abroad  the  light  and 
perfume  of  celestial  worlds. 

While  Paul,  the  most  illustrious  of  Christian 
preachers,  cried  out,  "Evil  is  present  with  me;" 
while  the  great  Greek  philosophers  sanctioned 
some  of  the  worst  vices;  while  the  founders  of 
other  religions  have  given  a  composite  of  snatches 
of  divine  inspiration  with  immense  textures  of  hu- 
man guesswork  and  invention ;  while  Christian 
poetry  finds  its  pathos  in  the  stream  of  penitence 
which  runs  through  its  melodies,  Jesus  not  only 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  225 

asked  "Which  of  you  convinceth  me  of  sin?" 
but  he  could  say  "I  am  the  truth,"  and  in  His 
prayer  for  His  disciples  in  the  parting  hour  could 
exclaim,  "I  have  finished  the  work  Thou  gavest 
Me  to  do."  Can  I  bring  you  still  nearer  to 
Him?  His  heart  was  ever  open  toward  God 
and  man,  with  an  apparent  consciousness  of  per- 
fect oneness  with  both.  It  was  His  daily  bread 
to  do  His  Father's  will.  His  piety  was  abso- 
lute, and  His  life  toward  men  was  unbroken 
love.  Moving  among  all  classes,  from  the  fish- 
ing boat  to  the  throne,  talking  with  the  twelve, 
and  with  the  thousands,  with  children  and  with 
priests,  everywhere,  at  home  or  on  the  dusty 
road,  in  the  temple  or  by  the  seashore,  he  is 
always  the  same  gracious,  inspiring,  lofty,  yet 
familiar  friend,  brother,  teacher.  With  a  good- 
ness which  felt  for  physical  suffering.  He  com- 
bined a  faith  in  the  possibilities  of  human  nature, 
which  not  only  led  Him  to  proclaim  the  highest 
spiritual  truth  to  an  outcast  woman,  but  also  to 
commit  His  Gospel  and  kingdom  to  His  dis- 
ciples, leaving  to  His  followers  the  work  of  teach- 
ing the  nations,  with  no  constitution,  no  laws,  no 
written  documents  in  their  hands,  sending  them 
to  their  colossal  task  with  no  fixed  and  definite 
rules  with  regard  to  Church  government  or 
methods  of  administration,  giving  them  the 
liberty  of  forming  Christian  societies  and  adjust- 
ing themselves  to  ever-changing  circumstances, 
and   entrusting  them,  under   His   spiritual  guid- 


2  26    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

ance,  with  the  majestic   mission  of  evangelizing 
the  earth. 

Jesus,  as  we  know,  rose  above  the  formalism 
of  the  Pharisee  and  the  sceptical  looseness  of  the 
Sadducee.  He  rescued  the  Mosaic  statutes 
from  their  accumulated  errors,  and  declared  love 
to  be  the  whole  law.  He  splintered  the  granite 
walls  of  dead  observance,  and  announced  that 
the  Sabbath  was  made  for  man's  good.  Ascend- 
ing above  local  and  national  prejudice  He  pro- 
claimed Himself  to  the  Jews'  most  hated  enemies, 
the  Samaritans.  He  lived  and  died  with  the 
consciousness  of  the  whole  world's  needs  in  His 
heart  and,  while  filled  with  the  loftiest  purposes 
for  all  mankind,  was  He  not  lovingly  faithful  to 
those  nearest  His  own  life?  It  has  been  said  of 
Rousseau  that  his  creed  combined  love  to  man- 
kind in  general,  with  hatred  to  every  individual 
he  met,  but  Jesus  was  not  only  compassionate 
to  the  world,  but  charmingly  affectionate  to 
every  little  child.  Galilee  found  in  Him  a 
friend  and  physician;  our  race  finds  in  Him  a 
brother.  There  was  nothing  exclusively  Jewish 
about  Him  excepting  His  dress  and  His  speech. 
Other  great  men  seem  to  belong  to  some  nation 
or  age.  Moses  was  a  Hebrew,  Socrates  an 
Athenian,  Confucius  a  Chinese,  Buddha  a  Hindu, 
Mohammed  an  Arab,  Luther  a  German,  not  only 
in  blood  but  in  spirit,  but  Jesus  belongs  as  much 
to  the  West  as  to  the  East,  to  America,  as  to 
Palestine,  to  the  dying  martyr  at  Smithfield  as 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  227 

to   the   dying  thief   on   the  cross.      It  has  been 
said  of   Him,  that  "He  found   disciples  and  wor- 
shipers among  the  Jews,  although  He  identified 
Himself  with  none    of    their   traditions;  among 
the  Greeks,  though  He  proclaimed  no  new  system 
of  philosophy;  among  the  Romans,  although  He 
fought   no   battles  and   founded  no  worldly  em- 
pire; among  the  Hindus,  who  despise  all  men  of 
low  caste;  among  the  black  savages   of  Africa, 
the   red   men   of  America,    as   well  as  the  most 
highly  civilized   nations  of  modern  times,  in  all 
quarters    of    the    globe."     O    Nazarene !    Thine 
empire  overleaps  all  kingdoms,  as  Thy  full  orbed 
manhood    embraced   all   virtues.      In    Thee   was 
found  the  perfection  of  opposing  graces,  meek- 
ness and  majesty,  feminine  tenderness  and  manly 
strength  and  childlike   innocence,  with  a  courage 
above  that  of  Athanasius,  an  equanimity  eclips- 
ing that  of  William  of  Orange,  a  moral  intensity 
deeper  than   Dante's,  a   self-sacrifice  more  won- 
drous than  Sakya   Muni's,  and  a  benevolence  at 
whose  fount  of   fire   John   Howard  and  Florence 
Nightingale     lit     their    torches.        Thou     didst 
scourge  the  hypocrite  and  forgive  the  outcast, 
and  weep  for  Thy  dead  friend,  and  die  for  Thine 
enemies;  in  Thee  we  behold  the  equilibrium  of 
ethics  and  piety,  the  harmony  of  God  and  man, 
the  sweet  marriage   of  contrasting  virtues.      Our 
prisms  may  analyze  the  beam  of  Thy  glory,  and 
our  eyes  may  gaze  on  the  nine-fold  wonder,  but 
if  the  white  splendor  of  Thy  very  self  fell  upon 


228    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

us,  we  should  hide  our  faces  before  its  insufTer- 
able  beauty.  Well  did  the  old  saint  of  Christian 
art,  Fra  Angelico  the  blessed,  paint  Thy  face  on 
bended  knees;  we  too  can  but  worship,  for,  as 
we  look  through  the  fair  curtain  of  Thy  perfect 
humanity,  there  dawns  on  our  faith  the  adorable 
radiance  of  Thine  undimmed  divinity. 

Thus,  the  Christian  believer  may  go  to  all 
nations,  and  may  say,  "Behold  the  man,  the 
bright  consummate  flower  of  the  race,  the  Son  of 
Man,  the  Son  of  Humanity."  We  may  say  with 
one  of  his  disciples,  "He  is  the  universal  Homo, 
blending  in  Himself  all  races,  ages,  sexes,  tem- 
peraments. He  is  the  essential  Vir,  from  the 
hem  of  whose  robe  virtue  is  ever  flowing.  He, 
Himself,  realized  Auguste  Comte's  majestic 
dream  of  the  Apotheosis  of  Humanity."  Is 
there  one  word  of  intellectual  or  moral  eulogy 
that  does  not  befit  His  name,  who  not  only  was 
all  that  we  adore,  but  did  all  that  man  needs  as 
his  Saviour  and  Captain  of  Salvation?  To  His 
perfect  moral  glory  He  added  the  majesty  of 
suffering,  and  He  bore  the  manifold  indignities 
of  malice  and  cruelty  and  ingratitude,  not  with 
Stoic  hardness,  but  with  more  than  womanly 
sensitiveness,  and  with  a  calmness  which  was  a 
benediction  of  peace  to  His  followers.^  Nearly 
every  step  of  His  ministry  was  beset  with  oppo- 
sition, contradiction,  and  grief.  In  the  ribald 
blasphemy  of  His  foes   He  was  linked  with  the 

'Appendix,  Lecture  V,  Note  3. 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  229 

Prince  of  Devils.  He  trod  the  winepress  of  His 
agony  alone,  forsaken  in  His  darkest  hour  by 
His  own  disciples.  But,  sustained  by  the  might 
of  love,  with  quietness  unbroken  by  a  murmur, 
calmly  as  the  falling  sun  of  eventide.  He  passed 
up  the  tragic  slopes  of  Golgotha,  and  with  for- 
giveness for  His  murderers  He  closed  His  life  of 
transcendent  and  spotless  virtue  with  the  im- 
mortal infamy  of  the  Cross. 

O  friends  of  truth,  may  not  all  men  rightly 
look  to  Him,  and  exclaim  "Our  King!"  And 
may  not  Christians  go  to  men  everywhere  and 
say,  "This  matchless  personality  is  worthy  of  all 
your  faith  and  affection.  He  is  to  be  believed 
in  what  He  said  of  Himself;  He  is  the  ideal  and 
Universal  Man,  and  He  is  the  Son  of  God.  The 
perfection  of  His  wisdom  shows  that  He  was  not 
deluded,  and  the  perfection  of  His  holiness  that 
He  was  not  a  pretender;  therefore  men  are 
bound  to  accept  His  interpretation  of  Himself. 
He  could  say,  "Before  Abraham  was,  I  am," 
"He  that  hath  seen  Me  hath  seen  the  Father." 
He  could  pardon  sin  in  His  own  name.  He 
could  rightly  call  Himself  the  light  of  the  world, 
and  make  Himself  the  center  of  His  own  revela- 
tion, with  a  self-assertion  which  would  be  blas- 
phemy in  any  other.  He  could  declare  Himself 
the  judge  of  the  living  and  the  dead,  and,  with 
spirit  unsubdued,  expiring  on  the  Cross,  with  a 
mighty  host  about  Him  hideous  with  brutal  joy 
over  His   shame   and   apparent   defeat,  He  could 


230    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

tranquilly  speak  to  the  penitent  robber  at  His 
side,  and  proclaim  Himself  the  Lord  of  that 
mysterious  realm  lying  beyond  the  boundaries 
of  the  tomb.  There  need  be  no  hesitation, 
therefore,  or  uncertainty  in  receiving  His  de- 
claration that  He  transcended  the  saints  and 
prophets,  the  priests  and  kings  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. When  he  declared,  as  one  has  written, 
that  "He  is  the  living  bond  of  unity  necessary 
to  fellowship  among  men  and  the  worship  of 
God";  that  "He  is  suf^cient  for  every  human 
need,  and  becomes  through  His  death  only  the 
more  mighty";  that  "He  is  universal,  no  local 
or  provincial  person,  but  one  who  invites  all,  and 
promises  rest  to  all  he  invites"  ;  and  that  "He  is 
directly  accessible  to  all;"  His  august  character 
vindicates  every  claim,  while  the  record  He  has 
made  in  history  is  a  second  divine  authentica- 
tion establishing  his  every  word  as  truth  and  life. 
Surely  His  Gospel,  centering  in  such  a  person, 
has  this  peculiarity,  among  others,  that  it  can 
be  preached  and  made  the  theme  of  a  life-giving 
instruction  which  is  never  exhausted.  It  has 
established  in  Christendom  an  institution  no- 
where else  discoverable,  the  pulpit,  which  has 
become  the  seminary  and  seed-ground  for  all  the 
higher  elements  of  civilization.  While  Bud- 
dhism can  be  explained  and  can  be  disseminated 
by  the  living  voice,  it  has  never  built  up  a  pulpit 
like  that  which  distinguishes  the  world  of  Chris- 
tianity.     It  has  no  such  literature  of  spoken  elo- 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  231 

quence  and  power  as  that  by  which  the  living 
Christ  is  brought  home  to  living  hearts  to-day. 
Would  a  library  fully  set  forth  the  pre-eminent 
and  undying  influence  which  goes  out  from  Him, 
who  was  the  Word  made  flesh  and  dwelling 
among  men,  and  who  is  made  real  and  mighty 
by  His  Spirit  wherever  His  truth  is  proclaimed? 
Did  you  ever  think  how  all  the  great  conver- 
sions, by  which  vast  energies  have  been  set  in 
motion,  have  had  direct  relation  to  the  Christ? 
Paul,  gaining  at  the  gates  of  Damascus  his  vision 
of  the  Nazarene;  St.  Augustine,  finding  in  Jesus 
the  attraction  in  whom  all  souls  may  secure 
peace;  Luther,  discovering  the  way  of  life  in  the 
Erfurt  monastery;  John  Bunyan  finding,  like 
his  own  pilgrim,  the  secret  of  the  Cross;  John 
Wesley,  learning  from  a  Moravian  missionary 
the  emancipating  truth  of  free  salvation  through 
the  Redeemer's  grace;  Mozoomdar,  under  the 
grim  old  seasum  tree  in  the  Hindu  College  com- 
pound, with  his  sudden  vision  of  Jesus  as  a 
strange,  human,  kindred  love,  becoming  at  his 
time  of  deepest  need  the  most  sympathetic  of 
friends, — what  are  these  but  symbolic  illustrations 
of  the  working  of  that  majestic  divine  presence, 
through  whom  God  has  become  real  to  the  heart 
of  humanity? 

And  while  we  may  rightly  believe  that  in 
Christ  are  all  possible  ethical  reforms,  the  forces 
of  all  social  progress,  the  spiritual  energy  that 
shall  yet  assimilate  to  its  own  divine  quality  the 


232    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

nations  and  institutions  of  men,  I  always  feel 
His  greatest  victories  have  been  within  the  soul, 
and  we  are  not  surprised,  therefore,  that  Chris- 
tianity has  produced,  among  the  more  highly 
gifted,  characters  of  such  force  and  radiance  as 
we  find  in  every  age  from  the  days  of  Paul  to 
those  of  Livingstone.  Asiatic  scholars  coming 
to  America  and  Great  Britain  have  expressed  to 
me  their  admiration  and  surprise  at  the  character 
of  the  Christian  women  whom  they  have  seen — 
women  possessed  of  force  and  culture  quite  equal 
to  that  which  they  have  known  in  the  men 
among  whom  they  have  been  wont  to  associate. 
Any  adequate  knowledge  of  Christian  lands  and 
of  Christian  history  must  fill  the  non-Christian 
mind  with  amazement  at  the  variety  and  force  of 
that  manhood  and  womanhood  which  are  the 
supreme  results  of  the  Gospel.  It  is  a  many-sided 
character  that  the  all-sided  Man, through  His  spirit 
and  truth,  has  fashioned.  Oh, what  a  galaxy  shines 
in  the  heaven  of  Christian  civilization !  the  king- 
liest  men  and  the  queenliest  women  of  all  time  clus- 
tering around  the  Star  which  has  become  the  Sun ! 
There  is  the  heroic  Apostle  to  the  Gentiles,  so 
great  that  through  him  perhaps  we  gain  our  best 
ideas  of  the  moral  grandeur  of  Paul's  Master. 
There  is  John,  transfigured  in  the  light  which 
shone  upon  him  from  the  days  of  his  young 
manhood  to  the  beautiful  old  age,  out  of  which 
he  passed  into  eternal  youth.  There  is  the 
greatest  of  the   Latin   Fathers,  his  eyes  fixed  on 


THE     UNIVERSAL   MAN.  233 

the  Cross.  There  is  he  who  held  out  alone 
against  the  world,  and  with  whose  name  we  ever 
associate  the  supreme  declaration  of  our  Lord's 
divinity.  There  is  Bernard  of  Clairvaux,  his 
whole  life  a  passion  for  holiness.  There  is  the 
Florentine  poet,  illumined  in  the  radiance  which 
he  climbed  through  three  worlds  to  see.  There 
is  St.  Francis  of  Assisi,  the  most  loveable  of  all 
the  mediaeval  saints.  There  is  the  greatest  of 
German  reformers,  whose  manhood  is  rugged 
enough  to  be  symbolized  by  mountains,  whose 
heart  is  tender  enough  to  be  likened  to  the 
brooks  gushing  from  the  mountain  side.  There 
is  the  sublimest  figure  in  the  literary  history  of 
England,  in  whom  the  passion  for  liberty  and 
righteousness  glowed  like  the  fires  of  ^Etna,  lift- 
ing his  planetary  orbs  of  song  like  clashing 
cymbals  above  his  head,  in  praise  of  the  Son  of 
God.  There  are  all  the  great  reformers  and 
evangelists  of  English  annals  from  Wycliff  to 
Wesley,  whose  consecration  to  the  spiritual  bet- 
terment of  England's  poor  brings  them  into  line 
with  the  true  Apostolic  succession.  There  are 
men  like  Thomas  Arnold,  whose  soul  moulded  a 
generation,  and  like  Maurice,  whom  Gladstone 
called  a  spiritual  splendor.  There  are  states- 
men beneath  the  shadow  of  whose  kindness  and 
moral  kingliness  nations  have  rested  securely. 
There  are  all  the  greatest  artists,  from  Michael 
Angelo  to  Rembrandt,  and  all  the  greatest 
musicians   from    Palestrina   to    Beethoven,  and  a 


234    CHRISTIANITT,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

shining  host  of  the  poets,  from  Bernard  of  Cluny, 
to  Tennyson,  the  Brownings,  and  Whittier.  There 
are  the  humble  souls  whom  God  has  made  lofty, 
and  the  lofty  souls  whom  Christ  has  made  lowly, 
— not  a  few  hundreds  only,  but  scores  of  thou- 
sands, living  to-day,  and  living  always,  to  know 
whom  is  to  get  some  fuller  knowledge  of  the 
Prince  of  Glory,  and  whose  deeds  of  mercy  and 
words  of  truth  and  love  keep  alive  the  spirit  of 
the  Man  of  Galilee. 

Christian  missionaries  go  to  other  lands  and 
find  among  their  peoples  a  knowledge  of  truth, 
corresponding  in  a  measure  with  Christian  truth. 
When  they  bring  to  others  the  lofty  message  in 
regard  to  God,  they  find  that  other  faiths  speak 
of  Brahma  and  Allah  and  Shangti,  and  Mani- 
tou,  the  Supreme  Spirit  of  Heaven  and  Earth. 
Hinduism  has  its  trinity,  and  the  Moslem  has  his 
Bible,  which  speaks  in  no  uncertain  praise  of  the 
Christian  Scriptures.  The  Parsee  points  to  his 
sacred  Zendavesta,  full  of  spiritual  sublimity, 
while  the  sacred  Books  of  the  Hindu,  the  Bud- 
dhist, and  the  Confucianist,  far  surpass  the 
Christian  Scriptures  in  number  and  extent. 
Other  religions  have  their  prophets  and  sages,  as 
numerous  as  those  of  the  Hebrew  and  Christian 
tradition,  their  sacred  cities,  their  temples, 
almost  equaling  the  grandeur  of  St.  Peter's,  their 
priests,  their  propitiations,  their  incarnations, 
their  doctrines  of  Heaven,  Nirvana,  and  Hell. 
The  missionary  goes  to  a  world  pre-occupied  by 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  235 

religion ;  but  the  reason  that  he  has  in  many 
lands  made  such  progress,  though  heralded  by 
no  blare  of  trumpets,  and  confronted  by  im- 
memorial priesthoods  and  prejudices,  and  hin- 
dered by  the  divisions  of  Christendom,  is  that  he 
has  been  able  to  show  that  all  the  truths  of  other 
religions  are  found  in  Christ's  Gospel,  and  found 
there  in  completer  and  purer  form;  and,  be- 
cause, supported  and  inspired  by  the  Holy 
Spirit,  he  has  been  able  to  show  that  in  Jesus 
Christ,  who  lived  among  men  and  died  for  our 
sins;  in  a  Saviour  who  is  the  Son  of  God,  illus- 
trating every  human  virtue  and  glorifying  our 
earth  by  His  sinless  and  holy  presence, — there  is 
lodged  a  divine  power  and  love,  able  to  save,  as 
one  has  said,  "to  the  uttermost  ends  of  the 
earth,  to  the  uttermost  limits  of  time,  to  the 
uttermost  periods  of  life,  to  the  uttermost  lengths 
of  depravity,  to  the  uttermost  depths  of  misery, 
and  to  the  uttermost  measure  of  perfection." 

Thoughtful  men  in  India  perceive  in  Christ 
the  reconciler  of  the  religions  of  the  world,  and 
have  rendered  the  race  a  service  by  fastening  the 
mind  on  one  truth,  that  all  the  great  faiths  find 
in  Jesus  their  fulfillment.  As  Christ  blends  in 
Himself  "ail  race-marks,  and  illustrates  in  Him- 
self all  essential  human  capacities;"  and  as  by 
His  death  on  the  Cross  He  has  given  to  Jew  and 
Gentile,  to  Greek  and  barbarian,  to  bond  and 
free,  to  man  and  woman,  the  one  central,  shin- 
ing object   of  moral  sublimity;   as  by  His  teach- 


236    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

ing  of  love  and  neighborhood,  of  humanity  and 
of  mercy,  He  has  made  Himself  the  brother  of 
all  men,  so  the  world  may  discover  in  His  per- 
fect faith,  as  another  has  said,  "  all  that  is  good 
in  all  other  religions,  the  symbolism  of  India, 
the  aspiration  of  Egypt,  the  estheticism  of 
Greece,  the  majesty  of  Rome,  the  hopefulness 
of  Persia,  the  conservatism  of  China,  the  mys- 
ticism of  India,  the  enthusiasm  of  Arabia,  the 
energy  of  Teutonia,  the  versatilities  of  Chris- 
tendom." 

As  we  look  around  the  world  to-day,  we  dis- 
cover no  universal  church  having  one  outward 
organization.  But  there  is  unity  in  Jesus  Christ. 
All  claim  and  worship  Him.  To  Him  the 
Greek  Catholic  Church,  rich  in  the  memories  of 
Clement,  Origen,  Chrysostom,  bows  in  adora- 
tion. To  Him  the  Roman  Catholic  Church, 
starred  with  great  names,  Ambrose,  Fenelon, 
Bossuet,  Xavier,  Newman,  renders  divine  hom- 
age. The  Anglican  Church,  in  all  its  wide  con- 
stituency, builds  on  the  Christ  a  main  hope  of 
the  reunion  of  Christendom.  To  that  Christ  the 
Lutheran  and  Reformed  Churches,  and  all  their 
progeny,  give  loving  worship  as  to  the  Son  of 
God,  in  whom  dwelt  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead 
bodily.  There  are  many  words  of  fear  and 
doubt  "rattling  in  the  throat  of  our  dying  cen- 
tury," but  one  brave  word  of  faith  rings  out  as 
never  before,  Christ!  Christ!  I  see  agitation, 
unrest,  progressive  movement  in  all  the   denomi- 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  237 

nations,  among  all  peoples,  in  all  social  organ- 
isms; there  is  no  quiet  anywhere,  and  all  seem 
to  be  looking  toward  one  goal.  There  is  move- 
ment among  Baptists,  and  Presbyterians,  and 
Congregationalists,  and  Lutherans,  and  Metho- 
dists, and  Roman  Catholics,  and  Episcopalians. 
Some  of  them  are  losing  their  hold  of  cherished 
dogmas  and  practices.  Some  are  feeling  unrest 
on  account  of  the  barriers  which  keep  them  from 
uniting  more  perfectly  with  other  disciples.  A 
new  age  is  being  born  out  of  the  gestation  of  our 
times.  And  what  a  stir  we  begin  to  discover  in 
the  camps  of  the  non-Christian  systems !  They 
look  forward  to  impending  changes.  They  feel  the 
contact  with  Christendom  and  are  absorbing  Chris- 
tian ideas  as  if  they  were  aboriginal  truths  of  their 
own  philosophies.  And  what  means  this  wide 
social  restlessness,  men  seeking  a  fairer  heritage, 
a  larger  place,  a  fuller  share  of  this  world's 
opportunities,  except  that  the  Christian  idea  of 
manhood  and  its  worth,  of  brotherhood  and  its 
claims,  is  gaining  ampler  acceptance?  In  all 
these  bodies  the  lines  of  movement  are  forward ; 
but  strange  to  tell  the  lines  are  not  parallel,  but 
convergent,  and  they  all  bend  toward  the  teach- 
ing and  the  person  and  the  work  of  Jesus  Christ, 
who  is  the  one  bond  and  the  one  goal.  All  the 
light  of  human  hope  gathers  more  and  more 
about  Him,  and  the  closer  men  get  to  each 
other,  the  closer  they  get  to  their  King.  "If," 
says  Dean  Fremantle,  "the   human   race  is  one, 


238    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  is  to  be  drawn  into  unity,  it  is  impossible 
that  there  can  be  ultimately  different  religions." 
He  declares  that  "the  recent  Parliament  of  Re- 
ligions in  Chicago  has  widened  our  knowledge  of 
other  faiths  and  our  sympathy,  and  has  done 
much  to  remove  the  antagonisms  of  theology, 
and  to  bring  men  to  apply  the  great  general  prin- 
ciples underlying  all  religions,  but  of  which  the 
character  of  Christ  is  the  supreme  expression,  to 
bear  upon  the  general  life."  Truly  Christ  is  the 
meeting  place  of  humanity;  I  can  discover  no 
other,*  Who  can  ever  forget  that  in  that  great 
assembly,  out  of  which  this  Lectureship  sprang; 
who  can  forget,  as  another  has  written,  "that 
amid  all  that  was  said,  there  was  one  name  that 
towered  conspicuous  in  its  sublimity?  We 
criticised  not  only  the  theology,  but  the  motives 
and  characters  of  Buddha,  of  Confucius,  and 
Mohammed,  but  not  one  voice  from  the  far-off 
East  breathed  one  word  against  the  character  of 
Him  who  is  the  King  of  Kings  and  Lord  of 
Lords." 

His  kingdom  is  yet  to  come;  the  uttermost 
parts  of  the  earth  shall  be  given  to  Him  for  His 
possession.  The  prayer  which  he  taught  is  yet  to 
be  fully  answered.  For  the  establishment  and 
expansion  of  His  empire  have  been  the  on-go- 
ings  of  history.  For  this  the  Word  was  given, 
the  Lord  speaking  to  prophets  and  training  a 
chosen  nation ;  for  this  the  light  which  enlight- 

■*  Appendix,  Lecture  V,  Note  4. 


THE    UNIVERSAL   MAN.  239 

ened  every  man  has  been  shining  in  human 
hearts  the  world  over,  so  that  Greek  philosophy, 
and  Mosaic  legislation,  and  Buddhistic  thought, 
and  Roman  law,  and  Hindu  doctrines  of  the 
incarnation,  and  nineteenth-century  science,  may 
all  of  them  be  seen  at  last  to  be  schoolmasters 
leading  to  Christ.  For  this  the  heavens  broke 
open  and  revealed,  in  the  Universal  Man,  "in 
man  at  his  climax,"  the  saving  God.  For  this 
the  Son  of  Man  descended  into  the  gloom  of 
Gethsemane,  and  offered  Himself  on  Calvary,  a 
propitiation  for  the  sins  of  the  whole  world. 
For  this  the  Holy  Ghost  was  given  on  that  Pen- 
tecostal day,  when  Parthians  and  Medes,  Africans 
and  Jews,  Arabians,  and  strangers  from  Rome, 
received  the  glad  tidings  of  forgiveness  and 
reconciliation.  For  this  were  the  missionary 
toils  of  the  Apostles,  and  the  martyrdoms  of 
Ignatius  and  Perpetua,  and  the  long  agonizing 
conflict  which  destroyed  the  ancient  paganism  and 
placed  the  Cross  on  the  standards  of  Constantine. 
For  this  have  been  the  revolutions  and  triumphs 
of  the  waiting  and  suffering  ages.  AH  the 
achievements  of  modern  invention,  all  the 
accumulations  of  wealth  and  the  enterprises  of 
commerce,  the  building  of  great  universities,  the 
extension  of  the  empire  of  science,  the  rehabilita- 
tion of  old  nationalities,  are  significant  and 
luminous  as  they  contribute  to  the  fulfillment  of 
the  prayer,  "Thy  Kingdom  Come."  Emanci- 
pation in  America   is   seen  to  have  connection  in 


240    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  mind  of  Providence  with  EvangeHzation  in 
Africa.  The  pen  which  wrote  freedom  for  the 
slave  God  shall  change  into  the  sword  that  is  to 
destroy  the  degrading  spiritual  bondage  of  the 
African  queen.  The  Universal  Man  shall  yet  be 
the  Universal  King;  He  shall  yet  stand  upon  the 
earth,  while  many  crowns  from  many  lands,  with 
many  stars,  the  emerald  splendors  of  the  Pacific 
and  Indian  seas,  the  lustrous  coronet  of  Ethiopia, 
and  the  impearled  and  priceless  glories  of  the 
gorgeous  Orient  shall  be  laid  at  His  feet,  and 
the  nations,  having  wrought  out  the  divine  pur- 
pose, shall  be  no  more,  for  the  kingdoms  of  this 
world  shall  have  become  the  Kingdom  of  our 
Lord  and  of  His  Christ,  and  He  shall  reign  for 
ever  and  ever. 


THE  HISTORIC  CHARACTER  OF  CHRIS- 
TIANITY AS  CONFIRMING  ITS  CLAIMS 
TO  WORLD-WIDE  AUTHORITY. 


So  ist  ohne  Wunder  und  Mysterium  im  wahren  reli- 
eiosen  Sinne  keine  Offenbarung  Gottes  denkbar. — Christ- 
liche  Apologetik  von  Dr.  Herm.  Schultz,  p.  22. 

The  whole  substance  and  meaning  of  religion — life  in  God, 
the  forgiveness  of  sins,  consolation  in  suffering — she  [the 
church]  couples  with  Christ's  person;  and  in  doing  so  she 
associates  everything  that  gives  life  its  meaning  and  its  per- 
manence, nay  the  Eternal  itself,  with  an  historical  fact; 
maintaining  the  indissoluble  unity  of  both. — Christianity  and 
History,  Adolf  Harnack,  p.  17. 

Fiir  die  Junger  des  Herrn  sind  zweifellos  die  Erschein- 
ungen  des  Auferstandenen  der  entscheidende  Beweis  fiir 
ihn  als  den  Konig  des  Reiches  Gottes  und  als  die  vollkom- 
men  Offenbarung  Gottes  gewesen  und  die  Thatsache 
dieser  Erscheinungen  kann  fiir  keinen  Verniinftigen  zweifel- 
haft  sein,  so  mannigfaltig  auch  unsere  Berichte  liber  die 
einzelnen  Vorgange  dabei  in  Widerspriiche  verlaufen. 
— Christliche  Apologetik  von  Dr.  Herm.  Schultz,  p.  no. 

It  follows  that  the  Perfect  Man,  embodying  the  pre- 
cepts and  ideals  of  the  Perfect  Religion,  must  be  a  real 
historic  character,  exposed  to  all  the  trials  and  temptations 
of  mortal  man,  yet  triumphing  over  them — one  who  has  left 
his  impress  large  on  the  page  of  history.  The  story  must 
thus  be  on  the  one  hand  capable  of  examination  and  veri- 
fication by  the  scholar,  and  on  the  other  hand  capable  of 
apprehension  by  the  child. — Universal  Religion,  a  lecture 
delivered  at  Bangalore,  in  November,  1896,  by  Edward  P, 
Rice,  p.  7. 


SIXTH    LECTURE. 

THE    HISTORIC    CHARACTER     OF    CHRISTIANITY 
AS  CONFIRMING  ITS  CLAIMS  TO   WORLD- 
WIDE  AUTHORITY. 

There  is  no  other  form  of  art  which  is  so  in- 
wrought with  human  history  as  architecture. 
In  the  adornment  of  a  great  building,  the  choicest 
work  of  the  sculptor  and  painter  may  find  a  con- 
genial place,  and  by  such  a  structure  man  illus- 
trates his  conquests  over  Nature  and  over  Time. 
By  means  of  it  he  endeavors  to  show  that  he  has 
a  perpetuated  life  on  the  earth  ;  by  means  of  it  he 
tells  to  after  generations  the  story  of  his  thought ; 
but  when  the  building  is  meant  to  embody  the 
idea  of  worship,  when  it  is  so  constructed  as  to 
lift  the  heart  in  hope  and  aspiration  heaven- 
ward, when  it  is  so  massive  and  stately  as  to 
"fill  the  mind  with  awe  and  shut  the  soul  up 
in  tranquillity,"  and  when  it  is  so  linked  with 
the  life  of  a  great  people  as  to  be  the  symbol 
of  national  unity  and  power,  then  it  becomes 
an  object  of  grandeur  over-topping  the  Apen- 
nines and  the  Alps.  Such  a  building,  pre-emi- 
nently, is  the  now  finished  Cathedral  of  Cologne, 
the  noblest  monument  of  Gothic  architecture  in 
the  world,   its  two   completed   spires  stretching 

243 


244    CHRTSTIANITV,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

their  long  shadows  in  the  evening  twilight  across 
the  Rhine. 

I  would  have  you  look  upon  this  Cathedral  as 
a  majestic,  but  yet  inadequate,  illustration  of  the 
historic  character  of  Christianity.  The  Christian 
religion  is  a  religion  intertwined  in  its  life  and 
teachings  with  a  prolonged  and  impressive  historic 
development.  It  has  a  great  past.  It  is  not  the 
creature  of  a  day.  Into  it  the  nations  have 
brought  of  their  glory  and  honor.  It  is  associated 
with  prophets,  apostles,  kings,  sages,  saints,  and 
martyrs.  The  story  of  war  and  of  conquest,  of 
sin,  of  agony,  disappointment,  delay,  hope, 
aspiration  has  been  woven  into  its  essential  life. 
Its  history  has  proceeded  on  a  divine  plan  toward 
a  divine  consummation,  and  its  records  are  revela- 
tions, its  events  are  truths,  its  miracles  are  parables 
radiant  with  the  golden  light  of  celestial  love. 
Alone  of  all  the  religions  of  the  world,  in  a  sense 
which  I  shall  hereafter  explain,  it  is  historic. 

More  than  six  hundred  years  ago  were  laid 
the  foundations  of  the  Cologne  Cathedral.  Only 
a  small  portion  of  the  massive  structure  was 
ready  for  use  in  the  thirteenth  century.  De- 
layed by  poverty  and  war  and  national  discord, 
the  sublime  idea  of  the  unknown  architect  had 
a  slow  materialization.  But  when,  after  six 
long  centuries,  the  work  was  completed  amid  the 
rejoicings  of  Germany,  it  was  in  accord  with  the 
original  plan  of  that  marvellous  mind,  who,  from 
another  sphere  it  may  be,  had  patiently  watched 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  245 

the  slow  flowering  into  stone  of  his  lofty  con- 
ceptions. Upon  a  slight  eminence,  made  of  the 
debris  of  old  Roman  buildings  that  stood  there 
in  the  times  of  the  Caesars,  the  massive  founda- 
tions were  planted  forty  and  sixty  feet  in  depth. 
This  was  to  be  no  frail  and  yielding  fabric,  but 
one  wherein  should  be  illustrated,  so  far  as  man 
can  do  it,  the  security  and  eternity  of  God  Him- 
self. It  was  no  flimsy  and  faltering  trust  in  the 
Unseen  which  could  undertake  and,  after  dis- 
heartening delays,  at  last  complete  such  a  monu- 
ment of  Christian  Faith.  It  wearies  the  mind 
merely  to  contemplate  the  patient  toil  which 
must  be  continued  for  a  decade,  just  to  add  a 
few  more  string-courses  to  this  mighty  anthem 
in  stone.  Great  cities  are  burned  and  destroyed 
and  rebuilded  with  ampler  magnificence,  but  the 
hammers  are  still  smiting  and  the  chisels  are 
still  ringing  in  the  workshops  of  Cologne,  where 
generations  of  artisans  are  educated  into  artists, 
that  the  work  may  go  on.  The  quarries  of 
Drachenfels  and  Caen  yield  their  treasures  of 
rock,  to  be  floated  down  the  Rhine  or  carried 
by  means  which  to  the  old  Archbishops  would 
have  seemed  almost  supernatural ;  dynasties  rise 
and  fall,  new  continents  are  discovered,  new 
faiths  spring  up  to  threaten  the  old ;  the  soldiers 
of  Napoleon  desecrate  the  unfinished  building-; 
a  new  Germany  comes  to  life  and  demands  that 
the  old  Gothic  wonder  be  finished;  the  needle 
guns  of  Sedan   complete  the  restoration  of  Ger- 


246    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

man  unity;  French  cannon  are  molten  into  a 
chime  of  bells  for  the  gigantic  towers;  upward, 
upward  grow  the  blossoming  and  leafy  stones 
till  the  last  is  laid,  the  scaffoldings  are  taken 
down,  the  broken  sculptures  are  replaced,  the 
rubbish  is  removed,  and  the  princes  and  kings  of 
the  German  Fatherland  join  in  solemn  and  sub- 
lime Te  Deums  in  praise  of  Him,  whose  only  is 
the  Kingdom  and  the  Power  and  the  Glory. 

Have  we  not  here  a  parable  in  history  of  the 
Christian  Revelation,  of  its  majestic  foundation 
in  the  Old  Testament,  and  of  its  immovable 
basis  also  on  the  great  truths  of  natural  religion; 
of  the  slow  progress  and  unfolding  of  the  King- 
dom of  God  through  Hebrew  history,  and  of  its 
glorious  consummation  in  the  commonwealth 
which  Jesus  founded  and  sent  forward  on  its 
march  through  the  centuries?  Who  shall  ade- 
quately describe  the  majesty  and  grace  of  the 
Gothic  Cathedral  by  the  Rhine?  It  almost  re- 
quires an  education  to  get  any  real  conception 
of  it.  It  seems  like  a  product  of  nature,  some- 
thing that  grew  of  itself,  it  is  so  light  and  up- 
springing,  so  lovely  and  delicate  in  proportion 
and  detail.  But  when  you  ascend,  and  walk  in 
and  out  among  those  graceful  flying  buttresses 
and  beautifully  sculptured  pinnacles,  they  ap- 
pear as  solid  and  massive  as  mountains.  Stand- 
ing before  the  double  western  port,  and  looking 
upward  five  hundred  and  twenty-five  feet,  till 
your   eyes    rest    upon   the   topmost   stones,    the 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  247 

finials  which  crown  the  spires,  they  seem  to  you 
Hke  leafy  and  cruciform  ornaments,  which  you 
could  have  placed  there  with  your  own  hand ; 
but  each  one  of  those  finials,  when  put  in  posi- 
tion, had  the  weight  of  a  hundred  thousand 
pounds.  As  you  examine  and  study  the  re- 
moter parts  of  this  miracle  in  stone,  you  are 
fascinated  by  the  faithfulness  which  wrought  out 
the  hidden  ornamentation  with  the  same  pious 
care  that  delights  you  in  the  multitudinous 
sculptures  on  which  the  passer-by  may  place  his 
hand.  And  when  at  last  you  venture  within, 
and  walk  the  spacious  floors,  flooded  with  rain- 
bow light  from  the  windows,  which  are  the  work 
of  old-time  artists,  or  the  recent  splendid  gifts 
of  Bavarian  King  or  Prussian  Crown  Prince  or 
Imperial  Kaiser,  all  of  whom  have  passed  into 
the  unseen  world,  how  wondrous  are  these  lofty 
vaults  toward  which  instinctively  and  perpetually 
the  eyes  are  upturned;  how  solemn  the  deep- 
ening aisles,  how  beautiful  the  massive,  flowering, 
clustering  columns,  a  forest  of  stone  recalling  the 
primeval  temples  of  humanity,  the  leafy  fanes 
within  which  Druid  priests  and  Gothic  savages 
may  have  offered  their  worship  to  Odin,  Frija, 
Thor!  And  that  nothing  may  be  lacking  to 
inspire  and  teach  and  uplift,  how  wondrously,  in 
elaborate  sculpture  within  and  without,  and  how 
splendidly  in  gorgeous  panes,  stained  with  dyes 
that  are  as  "precious  as  the  blood  of  kings," 
is    pictured   and    unfolded   the    story    of    man's 


24S    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

redemption.  Patriarchs,  prophets,  missionaries, 
martyrs,  angels,  and  the  Man  Divine  pass  be- 
fore us  in  sublime  procession;  the  one  building 
epitomizing  the  life  of  humanity  and  lifting  our 
thoughts  above  man's  fall  and  above  his  present 
greatness,  to  that  future  in  which  the  redeemed, 
gathered  in  the  temple  of  God's  own  building, 
shall  share  the  glory  of  Him  in  whose  name  this 
Cathedral  rises  like  a  Psalm  to  heaven.  And  so 
Christianity  is  a  structure  to  which  all  beauty 
belongs,  as  well  as  all  massiveness — a  structure 
crowned  with  the  Cross  and  adorned  within  and 
without  with  images  of  sainthood  and  blazonries 
of  unmatched  historic  devotion  and  achieve- 
ment. It  is  a  sacred  edifice  which  shelters  and 
illustrates  the  chief  historic  development  of  man- 
kind;  it  is  itself  the  story  of  man's  redemption, 
through  divine  mercy ;  and  it  alone  points,  with 
sure  promise,  to  the  house  not  built  with  hands, 
eternal,  in  the  heavens. 

No  other  religion  could  be  symbolized  by  the 
Cologne  Cathedral.  Hinduism  might  find  its 
symbol  in  some  rock-hewn  temple  of  Hindustan, 
finished  a  thousand  years  ago,  and  now,  as  I 
hear  Indian  scholars  saying,  fast  falling  into 
decay;  and  Buddhism  may  be  likened  to  a 
painted  and  tiled  pagoda;  and  Islam  to  some 
aspiring,  crescent  -  crowned  and  minaretted 
mosque;  but  Christianity  is  the  only  historic 
structure  whereon  is  written  the  whole  life  of 
humanity;  the  only  temple   of  faith  which  sym- 


CHARACTER   OF   CHRISTIANITY.  249 

bolizes  the  story  of  man's  redemption;  the  only 
house  of  worship  which  shelters  the  peace,  the 
trust,  and  the  hope  which  are  furnished  by  a 
divinely  authenticated  Revelation ;  the  only 
sacred  edifice  crowned  by  the  Cross  and  re- 
splendent with  the  light  that  streams  from  the 
New  Jerusalem.  The  proposition  which  I  offer 
in  this  closing  Lecture  is  this :  That  Christianity 
alone  is  a  religion  of  historic  facts,  a  system  of 
faith  not  built  upon  a  philosophy,  or  merely  the 
ethical  teaching  of  some  saintly  founder,  but 
resting  on  what  is  surer  and  more  abiding,  a 
historic  basis  which  has  remained  unshaken  for 
nineteen  hundred  years.  That  foundation,  that 
history,  is  the  very  life  of  the  Christian  religion, 
a  history  centering  in  a  supernatural  Person  who 
sums  up  the  truths  and  vital  forces  of  Chris- 
tianity. Any  one  familiar  with  certain  forms  of 
Oriental  thought  will  realize  that  much  which 
has  been  set  forth  in  the  preceding  Lectures 
might  be  acknowledged  and  accepted  without 
changing  the  mental  and  spiritual  attitude  of 
the  Eastern  thinker.  He  would  say,  and  he  is 
learning  to  say,  "My  faith  is  broad  enough  to 
accept  truth  from  every  source;"  and  so  we  find 
that  Christian  ideas  are  being  taken  up  and  swal- 
lowed by  elastic  and  omnivorous  systems.  There- 
fore, to  be  true  to  the  whole  truth  which  Chris- 
tian believers,  from  the  beginning,  have  set 
forth,  it  must  be  shown  that  Christianity  is  fitted 
to   become   a  world-wide   faith,    demanding  not 


250    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  giving  up  of  any  spiritual  truth,  but  the 
renouncing  of  other  schemes  as  methods  of  salva- 
tion, because  it,  and  it  alone,  is  a  religion  of 
supernatural  historic  facts;  the  supernatural 
history  which  it  has  proclaimed  from  the  first 
is  true  history.  The  believer  in  some  other 
religion  may  remain  outwardly  loyal  to  it,  and 
accept  the  Fatherhood  of  God,  the  humanities  of 
Jesus,  the  ethics  of  the  New  Testament,  except 
where  they  interfere  with  artificial  social  distinc- 
tions, the  Christian  doctrine  of  immortality,  and 
I  know  not  what  besides;  but  let  him  accept  the 
incarnation  of  God  in  the  Jesus  of  the  Gospels 
as  an  actual  historic  occurrence;  let  him  believe 
that  Christ  came  from  Heaven  to  earth  as  the 
culmination  of  God's  previous  revelations  of 
Himself  to  men;  let  him  believe  the  supernatural 
signs  which  accompanied  the  ministry  of  Christ 
as  actual  events;  and,  if  he  follows  his  convic- 
tions, Christ  Himself  will  be  accepted  as  the 
divine,  authoritative,  final  Teacher  and  only 
Saviour  of  the  race.  Therefore,  it  is  supremely 
important  in  the  present  Lecture,  to  show  that 
Christianity  alone  is  a  religion  centering  in  such 
historic  facts  as  are  contained  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment. It  is,  also,  a  faith  set  in  the  midst  of  a 
great  history,  reaching  back  through  prophets, 
sages,  kings,  patriarchs,  toward  the  beginning 
of  recorded  annals.  It  is  a  religion  inwrought 
with  the  changing  and  advancing  life  of  the  most 
wonderful  of  peoples.      It   is  the  historic  flower 


CHAR  A  C  TER     OF  CHRIS  TIA  NI TT.  2  5  I 

of  Judaism.  "The  revelation,  recorded  in  the 
Bible,  is  a  jewel  which  God  has  given  to  us  in  a 
setting  of  human  history.  The  love  of  God  to 
His  people  now  is  a  continuation  of  that  which 
He  showed  to  our  fathers.  .  .  .  To  deny 
that  Christianity  can  ultimately  be  traced  back 
to  such  acts  of  revelation,  taking  place  at  a 
definite  time  in  a  definite  cycle,  involves  in  the 
last  resort  a  denial  that  there  is  any  true  religion 
at  all,  or  that  religion  is  anything  more  than  a 
vague  subjective  feeling. "  "  Revelation  itself  has 
become  a  force  in  human  conduct  only  by  first 
becoming  a  factor  in  human  history."  ' 

But  beyond  these  general  considerations  which 
are  true  and  important,  it  is  essential  that  we 
see  that  Christianity  centers  in  the  character, 
person,  teachings,  in  the  life,  death,  and  resurrec- 
tion of  Jesus  Christ.  The  facts  of  the  Gospels, 
truly  interpreted,  make  the  Gospel  the  divine 
evangel  which  we  believe  is  giving  life  to  the 
world.  The  New  Testament  history  is  the  life 
of  the  Christian  religion,  and  it  is  a  history  em- 
bodied in  the  Person  who  sums  up  the  truths  and 
vital  forces  of  Christianity.  If  Christ,  as  revealed 
in  the  Gospels,  is  a  historic  delusion  or  fabrica- 
tion, then  our  faith  is  vain,  and  we  have  believed 
a  lying  legend  or  a  delusive  myth.  If  the  his- 
toric foundations  are  gone,  then  the  Christianity 
of  the  future  will  no  more  resemble  the  Chris- 
tianity   of    the    past    than    a    shattered    church, 

'Appendix,  Lecture  VI,  Note  i. 


252    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

whose  underlying  basis  has  sunk  into  quicksands 
and  whose  walls  are  crumbling,  resembles  the 
Cathedral  of  Cologne.  Take  away  the  Gospel 
history,  and  our  divine  religion  becomes  only  a 
scheme  of  human  devising  or  a  system  of  morals, 
mingling  with  other  schemes  and  systems,  and 
losing  all  distinctive,  commanding,  victorious 
power. 

In  the  preceding  Lectures  we  have  been 
brought  face  to  face  with  most  commanding 
facts.  We  have  found  one  religion,  and  only 
one,  presenting  the  aspects  of  a  vigorous  faith  in 
all  lands  and  among  all  races.  We  have  found 
the  Christian  religion,  claiming  a  supernatural 
origin  and  preaching  the  supernatural  Christ, 
working^  such  effects  in  individual  and  national 
regeneration  as  to  add  strength  to  its  claims. 
We  have  found  a  unique  phenomenon  in  the 
Christian  Bible,  absolutely  the  only  universal 
Book,  unified  by  its  doctrine  of  the  kingdom  of 
God  and  by  its  disclosure  of  the  purposes  of 
Redemption.  We  have  found  it  a  volume  speak- 
ing with  strong,  clear  words  to  the  heart  of  every 
spiritual  need,  and  adapting  itself,  as  no  other 
book  does,  both  by  its  contents  and  its  form,  to 
the  mental  and  moral  peculiarities  of  all  races. 
We  have  also  seen  in  the  Christian  doctrine  of 
God  as  one — as  spiritual,  omnipresent,  holy, 
merciful — a  God  revealed  through  His  Son  as  the 
Redeemer  of  the  world.  We  have  found  in 
this  Christian   doctrine  of    the  Supreme    Being, 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  253 

an  adequate  basis  for  a  Universal  Religion.  We 
have  found  that  Christianity  presents  in  the 
Christ  the  Universal  Man  and  the  only  Saviour. 
We  have  seen  in  it  the  completion  and  fulfill- 
ment of  all  the  scattered  and  fragmentary  ideals, 
hopes,  and  longings  of  the  nations.  And  thus 
we  have  gained  the  right  vantage-ground  from 
which  to  survey  the  definite  claim  which  Chris- 
tianity has  always  made,  that  its  record  of  super- 
naturalism  is  historically  true.  From  a  broad 
survey  of  humanity  we  have,  I  hope  in  some 
degree,  become  convinced  that  man  needs  re- 
demption, and  that  we  can  look  nowhere  else, 
except  to  the  Christian  religion,  for  the  satis- 
faction of  his  profoundest  spiritual  needs. ^  I 
have  endeavored  to  make  it  reasonable  to  be- 
lieve, that  if  God  purposed  to  set  a  supernatural, 
authoritative  seal  on  one  religion  as  designed  for 
all  the  world,  it  can  only  be  the  Christian ;  on 
any  book,  it  can  only  be  the  Bible ;  on  any  one 
person,  it  can  only  be  Jesus  Christ;  on  any  one 
doctrine  concerning  Himself,  it  can  only  be  on 
the  radiant,  matchless  elements  of  Christian 
Theism. 

Christianity  is  the  only  religion  now  existing 
among  men  which  squarely,  unflinchingly,  and 
with  undisturbed  serenity  on  the  part  of  the 
great  preponderating  majority  of  its  intelligent 
votaries  and  expounders,  bases  itself  on  a  super- 
natural history.    Mohammedanism,  Christianity's 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  VI,  Note  2. 


254    CHRISTIANirr,  THE   WORLD-RELIOrON. 

chief  rival  in  the  reformation  of  Africa,  is  not  in 
the  same  sense  a  historic  reHgion  or  a  religion  of 
facts.  It  centers  in  a  book  of  precepts,  in  the 
teachings  of  the  Koran;  and  it  has  no  superna- 
tural story  to  tell  as  its  chief  message  to  men, 
like  that  which  gives  such  interest  and  splendor 
and  authority  to  the  Christian  Gospel.  Passages 
can  be  shown  from  the  Koran  that  testify  to  the 
authenticity  of  the  Christian  Scriptures,  which 
show  that  prophecy  and  revelation  are  with  the 
children  of  Israel,  and  which  point  to  the  divinity 
of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ;  and  whenever  Chris- 
tianity makes  any  serious  inroad  into  the  citadel 
of  Islam,  it  may  possibly  be  through  the  gateway 
of  those  Koranic  passages  which  acknowledge 
and  confirm,  rather  than  deny  and  oppose,  the 
supreme  and  central  facts  of  the  Christian  re- 
ligion. It  need  scarcely  be  said  that  Confucian- 
ism is  not  a  religion  centering  in  supernatural 
occurrences,  but  is  rather  a  collection  of  instruc- 
tions in  regard  to  social  ethics.  Hinduism  cer- 
tainly does  not  center  in  any  creative  personality 
living  at  a  definite  time  and  miraculously  reveal- 
ing God's  truth  and  love  to  men.  It  is  well 
known  that  nothing  is  more  averse  to  the  Hindu 
spirit  than  definite  history. 

What  has  impressed  itself  most  deeply  upon 
the  first  and  every  succeeding  generation  of 
Christians  has  been  the  person  of  the  historic 
Christ  as  revealed  in  the  Gospels.  The  case  is 
not  similar  with  Buddhism,  although  it  is  indeed 


CHARACTER   OF   CHRISTIANITY.  255 

more  of  a  personal  religion  than  the  others. 
Buddhism  is  a  system  of  ethics  rather  than  a 
divine  evangel.  "Christ's  mission,  even  more 
than  His  message;  His  deeds  of  love  and  mercy, 
His  patient  suffering,  His  self-sacrificing  death, 
above  all,  His  resurrection  from  the  dead,  and 
His  subsequent  ascension  into  heaven, — this  was 
the  subject-matter  of  the  proclamation  first  made 
by  His  followers  to  the  world.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  was  the  system  thought  out  by  Buddha, 
the  discourses  which  he  delivered,  and  his  rules 
for  the  guidance  of  his  disciples  that  appeared  to 
them  of  paramount  importance.  They  thought 
of  Him  mainly  as  the  teacher,  whereas  the 
primary  conception  of  the  early  Christians  was 
of  our  Lord  as  the  Saviour,  who  had  accom- 
plished, not  merely  taught,  the  salvation  of  the 
world."  It  is  well  known  that  we  have  no  life 
of  Buddha.  The  main  divisions  of  the  Buddhist 
canon  are  discourses,  the  rules  of  discipline,  and 
metaphysics.  In  the  fragmentary  notices  of  his 
personal  history,  we  find  that  information  is 
given  "solely  as  an  introduction  to  a  conversa- 
tion or  discourse;  here,  as  elsewhere,  the  system 
obscures  the  man."  The  gentle  sage  of  Asia 
lived  and  died,  we  know  not  exactly  when,  for 
the  date  of  his  death  is  placed  by  some  scholars 
in  the  year  543  B.C.,  and  by  others  in  the  years 
477,  430,  420,  412,  or  370.  The  working  force 
of  Buddhism  is  not  found  in  the  life  about  which 
so  little  is  known.      When  the  early  preachers  of 


256    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

"Nirvana  and  the  Law,"  journeyed  in  their 
saffron  robes  from  land  to  land,  they  told  the 
world  of  the  eight-fold  path  to  enlightenment, 
of  the  maxims  which  Gautama  uttered,  of  his 
regulations  for  the  discipline  of  his  disciples;  and 
their  reverence  for  the  Indian  saint  was  primarily 
for  him  as  a  teacher,  and  was  not  like  the  wor- 
shipful devotion  of  the  early  Christian  for  his 
Saviour,  who  came  from  the  bosom  of  the  God- 
head to  the  rough  and  cruel  deathbed  of  the 
Cross,  and  who,  lying  down  in  the  grave,  burst 
the  stony  sepulchre  and  came  forth  with  the 
light  of  immortality  upon  his  white  and  radiant 
brow. 

Thus  we  have  seen,  that  the  Christian  faith 
alone  is  proclaimed  as  primarily  a  religion  of  his- 
toric fact ;  neither  Confucianism  nor  Buddhism 
nor  Mohammedanism  is  built  upon  a  similar 
foundation,  and  that  religion,  which  is  in  many 
respects  greater  than  all  the  other  non-Christian 
faiths,  Hinduism,  is  likewise  unhistoric.  Its 
sublime  and  mystic  ideas,  and  its  innumerable 
idolatries,  are  associated,  it  is  true,  with  legends 
of  gods  and  heroes,  but  these  legends  "live  no 
longer  in  the  faith  of  reason,"  even  in  the  land 
which  gave  them  birth,  while  the  Christian 
Church,  in  all  its  great  divisions,  and  most  of  its 
minor  sects,  is  practically  united  in  that  historic 
faith  which  is  embodied  in  the  so-called  Apos- 
tles' Creed.  When  men  ask  Christian  disciples 
to  unite  with  the  believers  in  other  religions  on 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIAN  ITT.  257 

the  basis  of  what  all  have  in  common,  or  what 
is  fundamental  to  all,  the  just  answer  is:  "We 
are  glad  to  co-operate  for  common,  ethical  pur- 
poses, and  we  believe  the  co-operation  will  be 
much  larger  and  more  fraternal  than  it  ever  has 
been,  but  what  is  fundamental  with  Christianity 
is  that  which  is  distinctive  to  it — its  supernatural 
history."  This  is  the  one  thing  peculiar  to  our 
faith ;  it  has  gone  to  men  from  the  beginning,  it 
goes  to  men  now,  with  a  history  revealing  divine 
incarnation  and  redemption  as  verifiable  facts ;  it 
presents  that  history  as  centering  in  a  matchless 
person ;  it  furnishes  the  amplest  evidence  that 
Jesus  the  Christ  lived,  suffered,  died,  and  rose 
again,  thereby  laying  His  hands  with  divine  au- 
thentication on  His  messages  of  mercy.  It  holds 
up  the  life,  character,  and  work  of  One  who  has 
moulded  already  the  mightiest  nations  to  His  will, 
who  is  to-day  the  supreme  figure  and  force  in 
the  domain  of  religion,  and  who  towers  higher 
and  higher  above  the  loftiest  intellects,  and  the 
largest  souls.  Christianity  discloses  the  advan- 
tage of  a  historical  over  a  purely  philosophical 
faith — the  advantage  of  authority,  of  interest, 
of  adaptability,  of  trustworthiness,  of  spiritual 
power.  Christianity,  a  religion  of  facts,  is  not 
wanting  in  doctrine,  in  ethics,  and  philosophy. 
It  has  a  philosophy,  perhaps  as  deep  and  com- 
prehensive as  that  which  lies  in  the  vast  world  of 
the  Hindu  scriptures,  and  certainly  much  less 
ethereal  and  infinitely  more   consistent;    and    it 


258    CHR/STIAN/Tr,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

presents  an  ethics  confessedly  more  vigorous, 
vitalizing,  and  complete  than  that  which  was 
taught  by  Buddha,  the  most  famous  of  all  Hin- 
du sages.  But  Christianity  is  primarily  a  series 
of  miraculous  and  redemptive  occurrences,  em- 
bodying a  divinely  perfect  ethics,  verities  of 
celestial  fragrance  and  potency,  and  all  these 
are  wrapped  up  and  made  life-giving  by  the 
divinely  perfect  Teacher  and  Redeemer  who  is 
set  forth  in  the  Gospels.  I  know  that  some 
scholars  of  our  time,  possessed  by  the  philosophy 
which  rejects  the  supernatural,  have  eliminated 
from  their  faith  what  has  always  been  considered 
the  very  essence  of  Christianity,  and  have  still 
clung  affectionately  to  the  ethics  of  Jesus.  The 
scheme  of  Hegelianism,  revised  or  unrevised,  is 
to  reject  the  supernatural  in  history,  in  order  to 
get  easy,  unembarrassed  sweep  for  its  idea  of 
growth  and  development.  But  what,  after  a 
short  life,  has  been  in  Germany,  England, 
France,  America,  the  usual  history  of  move- 
ments within  the  Church  which  have  cast  out 
the  supernatural?  Free  religion,  spiritualism, 
irreligion,  rankest  unbelief,  and  materialism,  dis- 
trust of  all  schemes  that  imply  God, — these  are 
some  of  the  natural  results,  appearing  after  a 
short  course  of  development  from  a  plan  of  spir- 
itual life  which  denies  the  supernatural  in  Jesus 
and  in  His  Church.  "Without  miracle  and  mys- 
tery, in  the  true  religious  sense,  no  revelation  of 
God  is  thinkable."      "A  religion  without  miracle 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITT.  259 

may  turn  out  to  be  a  religion  without  God." 
Some  have  gone  with  their  new  Christian  Gos- 
pel to  the  working  people  of  great  cities,  and 
have  accomplished  something,  but  not  much  in 
comparision  with  the  historic  achievements  of 
the  original  Gospel  among  the  poor.  There  is 
no  reason  for  believing  that  a  message  which 
can  give  no  assurance  of  divine  love  and  forgive- 
ness, which  sinks  Jesus  to  the  level  of  any  noble 
philanthropist,  which  cannot  point  with  any  cer- 
tain faith  to  a  world  of  blessedness  beyond,  will 
bring  to  sad  hearts  the  comfort,  and  to  broken 
lives  the  help,  of  that  Gospel,  which  is  preached 
to-day  in  the  thousand  missions  of  the  world's 
great  cities. 

From  the  beginning  of  Christian  history  until 
now  there  has  been  substantial  agreement  in  the 
Church  as  to  the  supernatural  personality  of 
Christ,  as  to  the  signs  which  He  and  His  apos- 
tles carried  with  them,  and  as  to  His  glorious 
resurrection;  and  out  of  this  catholic,  historic 
faith  of  the  Church,  has  sprung  a  certain  distinc- 
tive and  noble  type  of  Christian  character.  It 
seems  plain  to  so  wise  a  man  as  Mr.  Gladstone, 
that  if  you  cut  away  this  faith  and  destroy  these 
roots,  the  distinctive  type  of  character  will  soon 
die  out.  As  that  type  is  not  found  where  Chris- 
tianity has  never  been,  why  should  it  continue 
when  Christianity  is  uprooted?  Now  that  the 
Gospel  of  Christ  has  created  great  areas  on  this 
planet  "where  a  decent  man  can  live  in  decency. 


26o    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

comfort,  and  security,  educating  his  children  un- 
spoiled and  unpolluted ;  where  age  is  reverenced, 
infancy  protected,  manhood  respected,  woman- 
hood honored,  and  human  life  held  in  due  re- 
gard,"— how  do  we  know  that  when  the  essential 
elements  of  the  Christian  Gospel,  as  Paul  and 
Luther,  as  Pascal,  Chalmers,  Bishop  Heber, 
Edwards,  Wesley,  Thomas  Arnold,  Spurgeon, 
Robertson,  Dr.  Duff,  and  Livingstone  would  have 
deemed  them,  are  exscinded,  it  will  continue,  age 
after  age,  to  work  its  old-time  wonders?  Because 
a  number  of  scholarly  men  and  women  have  been 
led  to  accept  a  philosophy  of  history  and  nature, 
which  forbids  them  to  believe  in  the  miraculous, 
shall  we  therefore  call  upon  the  Church,  girding 
itself  for  triumphs  to-day  as  never  before,  com- 
passing all  lands  with  its  missionary  army ;  shall 
we  call  upon  the  Church  to  reconstruct  its  the- 
ology by  taking  out  of  it  what  the  Church,  in  all 
its  branches,  has  always  believed?  Such  an  ap- 
peal is  a  summons  to  discord.  It  is  asking  a 
victorious  army,  in  the  thick  of  battle,  to  throw 
away  its  long-tried  weapons  and  manufacture 
new  ones.  Two  mistakes  are  made  by  the  dis- 
ciples of  other  religions  regarding  Christianity. 
In  the  first  place  they  so  look  at  the  divisions  of 
Christendom  as  to  forget  the  spiritual  and  intel- 
lectual unity  which  prevails  with  regard  to  what 
is  fundamental — namely,  the  truth  of  the  Gospel 
history  and  the  conditions  of  salvation.  In  the 
second  place,   the    non-Christian   faiths  overrate 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITT.  261 

the  weight  and  importance  of  the  philosophic 
dissent  from  historic  Christianity  in  Christian 
lands.  Comparatively  speaking  that  dissent 
represents  fragments,  asteroids — and  not  Jupiter, 
Saturn,  and  the  Sun. 

This  conflict  within  the  pale  of  Christendom, 
or  rather  within  the  regions  where  Christianity 
has  extended  itself,  between  faith  in  the  historic 
character  of  the  Gospels  and  unbelief,  is  not 
new.  Every  generation  goes  over,  with  more  or 
less  of  repetition,  the  ground  which  has  been 
tramped  for  ages,  and  it  would  seem  that  every 
wise  and  healthy  mind,  in  coming  to  a  settled 
belief,  must  take  into  account,  at  least,  the  gen- 
eral conviction  of  the  centuries.  Now  the 
solemn  voice  of  the  Christian  ages,  whether  it 
comes  to  us  in  the  claim  which  Jesus  made,  that 
his  miraculous  work  bore  witness  of  Him  as  sent 
from  God ;  or  whether  it  be  the  earnest  declara- 
tion of  Paul  in  the  Epistles,  which  even  Strauss 
and  Baur  and  Renan  affirm  that  Paul  wrote 
within  thirty  years  after  the  death  of  Christ,  that 
Jesus  rose  from  the  dead;  or  whether  it  be  that 
which  comes  from  the  early-formed  and  gener- 
ally-accepted Apostles'  Creed, — that  voice,  which 
was  not  smothered  in  the  catacombs  or  silenced 
in  the  Colosseum ;  which  persecution  could  not 
choke  in  Clement  and  Polycarp  and  Tertullian ; 
which  has  sounded  in  Christian  hymns  or  martyr- 
testimonies  from  the  days  when  the  smoke  of 
heathen  sacrifice  rose  from  the  seven  hills  bv  the 


262    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Tiber;  and  which  finally  burst  from  the  lips  of 
Chrysostom  in  the  capital  of  an  empire  which 
had  chosen  the  Cross  of  the  Galilean  peasant  as  its 
triumphal  battle-sign ;  that  solemn  voice  of  the 
centuries,  which  breaks  on  our  ears  from  the 
ancient  Councils  of  Nice  and  Chalcedon,  and 
from  the  latter  assemblies  of  Dort  and  Augsburg, 
from  Greek  basilica,  and  Romanist  temple,  and 
Protestant  cathedral ;  heard  amid  the  ranks  of 
Crusaders  storming  Jerusalem,  and  Puritans 
fighting  for  liberty  on  the  plains  of  England,  and 
Pilgrims  touching  the  icy  shores  of  the  New 
World ;  coming  to  us  from  the  cloister  of  the 
recluse  and  the  study  of  the  scholar,  sounding  be- 
neath the  storied  arches  of  Westminster,  and 
among  the  dusky  tribes  on  distant  shores,  who 
have  learned  to  sing  the  faith  of  all  the  Christian 
ages;  that  voice  which  breathes  its  grandeurs  into 
the  music  of  Handel's  oratorios  and  whispers  ce- 
lestial solace  into  the  heart  of  dying  believers;  a 
voice  speaking  to-day  from  nearly  all  the  thou- 
sand Christian  colleges  of  the  world,  and  from 
most  of  its  four  hundred  thousand  pulpits,  and 
which  gives  no  sign  of  being  silenced, — every- 
where affirms  as  its  grand  first  announcement, 
that  the  Christian  Gospel  is  a  disclosure  of  God 
manifest  in  the  flesh,  in  Jesus  Christ,  His  only 
Son,  who  lived  a  sinless  life  and  displayed  His 
divine  nature  and  commission  in  miraculous 
signs  from  heaven,  crowning  all  by  His  resur- 
rection from  the  dead. 


CHARACTER   OF   CHRISTIANfTV.  263 

There  are  those  who  do  not  believe  in  the 
supernatural  origin  of  Christianity,  and  on  whom 
is  imposed  the  task  of  explaining  away  the  Gos- 
pel narratives  on  the  ground  of  fraud  or  delusion ; 
of  trying  to  break  the  force  of  the  testimony 
sealed  with  the  heroic,  unselfish,  suffering  lives 
and  martyr  deaths  of  those  who  declared  that 
they  were  witnesses  of  Christ's  supernatural 
signs  and  of  His  risen  person.  To  them  is  given 
the  task  which  has  perplexed  and  bafifled  the 
sceptical  scholarship  of  a  hundred  years.  To 
that  scholarship  we  owe  a  large  debt  of  grati- 
tude. It  has  widened  our  knowledge  of  the  first 
century.  It  has  removed  much  of  error  and 
uncertainty.  It  has  conducted  its  investigations 
with  amazing  ingenuity  and  ample  learning; 
but,  "starting  from  a  philosophy  which  forbade 
it  to  accept  much  of  the  substance  of  the  Gospel 
narrative,"  the  sceptical  investigators  have 
proved  themselves  often  to  be  the  least  trust- 
worthy historical  critics.  As  Mr.  Balfour  has  well 
said:  "It  has  been  a  great,  though  common,  error 
to  describe  these  learned  efforts  as  examples  of 
the  unbiased  application  of  historic  methods  to 
historic  documents.  It  will  be  more  correct  to 
say  that  they  are  endeavors,  by  the  unstinted 
employment  of  an  elaborate,  critical  apparatus, 
to  force  the  testimony  of  existing  records  into 
conformity  with  theories,  on  the  truth  or  falsity 
of  which  it  is  for  philosophy,  not  history,  to 
pronounce."        The     unbelievers     must     give     a 


264     CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

rational  account  of  the  person  of  Jesus  on  the 
theory  of  His  being  a  faUible,  and  sometimes 
deluded  and  imperfect  man — an  undertaking  in 
which  Renan  made  such  a  brilliantly  grotesque 
failure — they  must  explain  away  the  universal 
Christian  faith  in  Christ's  resurrection,  a  faith  on 
which  even  Strauss  acknowledged  that  the 
Church  was  built;  a  faith  which  was  not  de- 
stroyed by  the  Jewish  authorities  in  Jerusalem, 
not  because  they  were  unwilling,  but  because  they 
were  unable.  They  must  tell  us  how  the  early 
Church,  with  no  appeal  to  make,  like  Moham- 
medanism, to  pride  and  human  passions,  but 
with  lowliness  and  purity  as  its  distinctive  vir- 
tues, and,  as  they  assert,  with  no  supernatural 
signs  attesting  their  message,  and  beset  by  such 
constant  and  remorseless  antagonism  on  every 
side,  was  not  at  once  extinguished.  After  their 
failure  in  this  undertaking  (and  the  confusion 
and  contradiction  in  their  ranks,  and  the  steady 
advance  and  conquest  of  historic  Christianity  in- 
dicate a  failure),  men  are  apparently  more  will- 
ing to  ponder  the  evidences  on  which  Christian 
faith  is  built,  and  which  have  proved  so  impreg- 
nable. 

It  is  not  a  marvel  that  so  many  Jews  and 
others  rejected  the  claims  of  the  crucified  Naza- 
rene  Prophet:  that  so  many  accepted  them  is  the 
wonder.  "The  reception  of  Christianity  by 
them,"  it  has  been  wisely  said,  "shows  prejudice 
overcome  by  something,  and  the  question  is,  by 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  265 

what?"  The  undeviating  Christian  faith  has 
been  that  prejudice  and  opposition  were  over- 
come in  part,  at  least,  by  the  supernatural  ac- 
complishments of  the  early  Christian  message. 

The  survey  which  we  have  made  together  of 
the  faiths  of  mankind,  of  their  strange  mixtures 
of  truth  and  error,  has  indicated  that  man  needs 
such  a  revelation  from  God  as  has  come  through 
Jesus  Christ.  The  dim  guesses  of  the  non-Chris- 
tian world  have  not  contented  the  mind.  The 
fatal  deficiency,  it  has  been  said,  of  Plato's  doc- 
trine of  immortality  is  "that  he  does  not  know." 
"We  will  wait,"  said  Plato,  "for  one,  be  it  a 
God  or  God-inspired  man,  to  teach  us  our  re- 
ligious duties,  and  as  Athene,  in  Homer,  says  to 
Diomed,  take  away  the  darkness  from  our  eyes." 
And  again  he  exclaims:  "We  must  lay  hold  of 
the  best  human  opinion,  in  order  that,  borne  by 
it  as  on  a  raft,  we  may  sail  over  the  dangerous 
sea  of  life,  unless  we  can  find  a  stronger  boat  or 
some  word  of  God  which  will  more  surely  and 
safely  carry  us."  The  sacred  literatures  show 
clearly  that  men  have  needed  more  certain,  au- 
thoritative guidance.  They  need  to  know  more 
fully  the  character  of  God,  especially  in  that 
which  is  hardest  to  credit  to  Him,  mercy.  They 
need  to  escape  from  the  terrible  guilt  and  slavery 
of  sin  and  to  find  one  able  to  deliver.  They 
need  some  solace  or  relief  from  the  av/ful  pres- 
sure of  human  sorrow.  The  New  Testament  re- 
veals the  divine   character  as   embodied  in  Jesus 


266     CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Christ.  It  illumines  and  makes  surer  all  the 
truths  of  God,  dimly  revealed  in  the  Hght  of 
nature.^  It  provides  a  remedy  for  the  malady  of 
sin,  which  the  testing  of  centuries  has  shown  to 
be  adequate.  It  brings  God  home  to  our  affec- 
tions in  the  person  of  His  dear  Son.  It  lifts  a 
future  world,  with  all  its  vast  and  vivifying 
power,  before  the  vision  of  the  human  soul.  It 
links  the  practice  of  the  most  perfect  ethics  with 
devotion  to  the  person  and  kingdom  of  a  divine 
Redeemer.  Such  merciful  and  lofty  purposes  on 
the  part  of  God  were,  not  without  the  most  rea- 
sonable warrant,  accompanied  by  signs  from 
heaven  attesting  the  messenger  or  messengers 
commissioned  to  first  teach  the  heavenly  doc- 
trine. 

Canon  Gore  has  defined  a  miracle  as  "an 
event  in  physical  nature  which  makes  unmistak- 
ably plain  the  presence  and  direct  action  of  God 
working  for  a  moral  end."*  "Miracles,"  he 
says,  "are  God's  protests  against  man's  blind- 
ness to  Himself,  protests  in  which  he  violates  a 
superficial  uniformity  in  the  interests  of  deeper 
law."  "If,"  he  adds,  "God  is  personal,  if  His 
being  is  better  expressed  in  human  will  and 
character  than  in  mechanical  motion  and  uncon- 
scious law,  miracles  with  adequate  cause  are 
neither  impossible  nor  unnatural."  Of  course, 
if  God   is  immanent   in   nature,  a  miracle  cannot 

^  Appendix,  Lecture  VI,  Note  3. 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  VL  Note  4. 


CHARACTER    OF   CHRISTIANITT.  267 

rightly  be  called  an  interference.  It  is  certainly 
irrational  to  say  that  miracles  are  events  without 
an  adequate  cause,  God  is  their  cause,  and  He 
surely  is  adequate.^  Why  should  any  thought- 
ful man  feel  that  the  Author  of  nature  can  never 
act  for  moral  ends  on  what  He  has  created, 
especially  if  He  has  overwhelmingly  important 
reasons  for  such  action  ;  if  He  wishes  to  show 
that  He  is  working  in  the  world  not  as  a  blind 
force,  but  as  a  personal  will,  having  the  highest 
moral  ends  in  view?  We,  ourselves,  for  com- 
monest practical  ends,  act  on  nature  in  such  a 
way  as  to  overcome  or  modify  her  laws.  We 
throw  a  stone  into  the  air,  and  temporarily  over- 
come gravitation :  we  ride  in  a  car,  and  forces 
under  human  control  overcome  inertia.  As  one 
has  said:  "Whoever  bakes  a  loaf  of  bread  brings 
into  being  a  thing  which  the  bare  forces  of  na- 
ture, not  controlled  and  assisted  by  man's  will, 
could  not  have  produced."  If  the  human  will 
may  thus  act,  why  not  the  divine  will?  Mr. 
Gladstone  has  well  said:  "It  can  be  neither  phi- 
losophical nor  scientific  to  proclaim  the  impossi- 
bility of  miracles,  until  philosophy  or  science 
shall  have  determined  a  lirnit  beyond  which  this 
extraneous  force  of  will  cannot  act  upon  or  de- 
flect the  natural  order." 

It  is  unreasonable  to  attack  miracles  on  the 
ground  of  their  improbability,  coupled  with  the 
probability  that   the   testimony   to   them    is   un- 

'  Appendix,  Lecture  VI,  Note  5. 


268    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

trustworthy.  Many  improbable  things  are  all  the 
while  taking  place.  Has  not  Whately  shown 
that  the  history  of  Bonaparte  contains  a  much 
"greater  amount  of  gross  and  glaring  improba- 
bilities than  any  equal  portion  of  Scripture  his- 
tory?" All  will  agree  that  the  old  Greek  spoke 
wisely  who  said,  "It  is  probable  that  many 
improbable  things  will  happen."  Our  lives  are 
filled  with  such  events.  This  is  a  wondrous  uni- 
verse, and  it  may  be  no  more  an  antecedent 
improba:bility  that  supernatural  signs  should 
inhere  in  God's  revelation  of  His  redeeming  love 
to  the  world  than  that  men  two  thousand  miles 
apart  should  speak  to  each  other,  or  that  the 
same  subtle  force  should  light  and  lift  and  drive 
a  car,  or  that  Lisbon  should  have  been  suddenly 
destroyed  by  an  earthquake,  or  that  the  mid- 
night should  be  illumined  by  suns  of  inconceiva- 
ble magnitude  and  unimaginable  remoteness. 

But  we  are  told  by  Professor  Huxley  (and  by 
Hume  before  him)  that  "human  testimony  to 
miracles  is  not  to  be  trusted."  He  did  not 
reject  miracles  because  they  are  so  mysterious 
and  improbable,  for,  as  he  wrote  to  an  English 
divine,  "The  mysteries  of  the  Church  are  child's 
play  compared  to  the  mysteries  of  nature.  The 
doctrine  of  the  Trinity,"  he  says,  "is  not  more 
puzzling  than  the  necessary  antinomies  of  phy- 
sical speculation;  virgin  procreation  and  resusci- 
tation from  apparent  death  are  ordinary  phe- 
nomena for  the  naturalist."    Therefore,  the  only 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  269 

question  at  issue  is  this:  Is  the  testimony  to  the 
Gospel  miracles  conclusive ;  are  the  evidences 
that  the  Apostle  told  the  truth  sufficient  to  re- 
move all  reasonable  doubt?  And  surely  this 
question  is  not  to  be  answered  by  impugning 
liuman  testimony  in  general,  for  every  one  of  us 
believes  many  improbable  things  on  human  testi- 
mony. Because  some  testimony  is  likely  to  be 
false  are  we  to  conclude  that  all  testimony  is? 
Some  books  are  trash.  Plato's  Republic  and 
Shakespeare's  Tempest  are  some  books.  There- 
fore, these  great  works  of  the  two  best  heads  in 
two  thousand  years  are  trash !  The  scepticism 
which  lumps  together  in  indiscriminate  condem- 
nation and  distrust  the  weak  and  doubtful  testi- 
mony to  the  so-called  miracles  of  mediaeval 
times,  and  the  testimony  to  our  Lord's  resur- 
rection, which  the  Apostles  sealed  with  their 
blood,  is  not  grounded  on  rationality.  That 
poetical  pessimist,  the  late  Matthew  Arnold, 
may  have  concluded  that  historical  Christianity 
rests  on  a  fairly  tale,  but  his  greater  father, 
Thomas  Arnold,  a  man  of  sounder  judgment, 
who  made  himself  a  great  name  in  sifting  the 
legendary  from  the  true  in  the  history  of  ancient 
Rome — this  man,  according  to  Dean  Stanley, 
"placed  the  supernatural  inspiration  of  the  sacred 
writers  on  an  imperishable  historical  basis."  And 
Niebuhr  wrote  that  "the  fundamental  fact  of  mir- 
acles must  be  conceded,  unless  we  adopt  the  not 
merely  incomprehensible  but  absurd  hypothesis 


270    CHRISTIANIT7',  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

that  the  HoHest  was  a  deceiver  and   His  follow- 
ers  either   dupes   or   liars."      But  dupes  or  liars 
could   not  have  given   us  such  a  portrait  of  per- 
fect   personality    as    shines    from    the    Gospels. 
Matthew  and  John,  the  publican  and  the  fisher- 
man of  GaHlee,  unless  painting  from  life,  would 
have  left  some  action  or  omission  to  act  to  stain 
the  fair  picture  of  an   incomparable  being,  "per- 
fect beyond  what  the  most  gifted  impostors  could 
fabricate  and   beyond  what  the  most  enthusiastic 
fanatics  could  have  dreamed."     We  should  not 
be  ready  to  eulogize  every  man  as  a  philosopher, 
simply  because  he  endeavors  to  place  a  miracle 
recorded   in  the  Gospels,  the  chief  book  of  the 
world,    in    connection  with    such    a   character   as 
that  of  the   Universal   Man  and  Saviour,  in  con- 
nection with   such    a   revelation    of   divine    truth 
and  love  as  that  which  fulfills  and  completes  all 
the    imperfect    and    scattered     messages    of    all 
earth's  seers   and    prophets;   a   miracle,  recorded 
by  several  men,  who  were  known  to  be  eye-wit- 
nesses, and  re-affirmed  by  many  others  who  had 
personal  knowledge  of  the  event — men  who  have 
every    air  of    candor    and    every   mark    of    good 
sense,    and   who    made    this,    and    other    similar 
miracles    the   substance    of    their   preaching   and 
testimony  through    lives   of   self-sacrifice    ending 
in  martyrdom ;   to  place  such  a  miracle,  I  say,  on 
the  same  level  of  improbability  or  imposture  with 
an  isolated  portent,  recorded   in  some   mediaeval 
chronicle  by  some  one  who  heard  that  such  and 


CHARACTER    OF   CHRISTIANITT.  271 

such  a  thing  occurred,  or  claimed  to  have  seen 
it,  but  about  whose  careless  testimony  there 
gathers  no  such  a  combination,  such  a  steel- 
linked  net  of  weighty  probabilities,  arguments, 
evidences,  concurrent,  independent,  mutually 
supporting,  confirming,  and  conclusive,  as  has 
been  shown  over  and  over  again  in  connection 
with  the  Gospel  narratives.  To  rank  the  resur- 
rection of  Jesus  with  the  story  of  a  "centaur 
trotting  down  Regent  street,  in  London,"  and 
to  compare  such  an  isolated  and  monstrous  and 
unmeaning  phenomenon  with  the  event  which 
gave  the  Church  of  Christ  its  being  and  its 
hopes  of  immortality,  and  to  attempt  to  dis- 
parage the  testimony  to  the  resurrection  by  ask- 
ing what  testimony  would  make  the  appearance 
of  the  centaur  credible  to  us,  is  only  to  show 
that  intellectual  smartness  does  not  always  go 
hand  in  hand  with  moral  depth  and  serene  saga- 
city. 

I  have  said  before  that  v/e  have  no  authentic 
life  of  Buddha;  but  we  have  three,  and,  if  we 
add  the  Gospel  of  John,  four  authentic  lives  of 
Jesus  the  Christ.  John's  authorship  of  the  fourth 
Gospel  has  been  seriously  attacked  only  in  the 
last  sixty  years;  and,  after  such  defenses  of  its 
Johnanine  authorship  as  those  of  Weiss,  Meyer, 
Godet,  Ewald,  Lightfoot,  Professor  Ezra  Ab- 
bott, Westcott,  Sanday,  and  a  score  of  others, 
there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  author 
was  a  Christian  of  Jewish  origin,  that  he  was  a 


272    CHRISTIANIT2\  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Jew  of  Palestine,  that  he  was  a  contemporary  of 
Jesus,  that  he  was  an  eye-witness  of  what  he 
recorded,  that  he  was  the  disciple  whom  Jesus 
loved,  that  he  was  John,  the  son  of  Zebedee. 
Sceptical  scholarship  has  been  forced  to  put  the 
proposed  date  of  its  authorship  farther  back  than 
Baur  thought  necessary.  It  is  not  congruous 
with  any  literature  which  we  have  from  the 
second  century.  And  no  one  has  answered  the 
question,  How  could  a  book  of  this  kind  be 
palmed  off  on  the  churches,  including  the  Church 
of  Ephesus,  where  John  lived,  so  soon  after  his 
death?  If  he  did  not  write  the  Gospel  that 
bears  his  name,  how  did  these  disciples  in  the 
churches  come  to  believe  he  did?  Eusebius  was 
aware  of  no  dispute  regarding  its  authorship. 
Origen  accounts  it  among  the  only  undisputed 
Gospels  of  the  Church  of  God  under  the  whole 
heavens.  There  is  no  defect  in  the  external 
evidence,  and  it  bears  the  marks  of  being  an  auto- 
biographic record  of  a  profound  and  affectionate 
soul  who  had  come  to  believe,  and  who  desired 
others  to  believe,  in  the  supernatural  nature 
of  the  Messiah.  If,  as  the  testimony  of  John, 
it  were  not  so  powerful  in  establishing  the  celes- 
tial authority  of  Christ's  mission,  the  anti-super- 
naturalists  would  not  have  so  violently  assailed 
it.  Traveling  back  toward  the  Apostolic  age, 
we  find  these  four  books  quoted  in  numerous 
writers  as  the  works  of  those  whose  names  they 
bear;  we  find  them  cherished  by  the  early  Church 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  273 

which  had  no  means  of  knowing  whence  they 
came;  we  find  them  distinguished  from  other 
Christian  literature  and  immeasurably  superior 
to  it ;  we  find  them  afifirmed  to  be  coeval  with 
the  churches  themselves;  we  find  the  same  evi- 
dences, only  more  definite  and  numerous  and 
strong,  for  believing  them  to  be  genuine,  that 
we  have  for  believing  that  Tacitus  and  Livy 
wrote  the  works  which  bear  their  names.  And 
opening  these  brief,  artless  narratives,  where  the 
silences  are  as  wonderful  as  the  things  said,  we 
find,  as  one  has  written,  that  "they  abound  in 
allusions  to  places,  local  customs,  characteristic 
ideas,  and  feelings,  such  as  no  counterfeiter, 
writing  at  a  later  day,  could  have  brought  into 
the  narratives." 

It  was  not  until  six  hundred  years  after  Bud- 
dha lived  that  the  Tri-pitaka,  (boxes  or  baskets), 
were  committed  to  writing  in  the  Pali  language. 
In  a  word,  as  it  has  been  said,  "Buddhism  knows 
nothing  of  sacred  documents  or  a  canon  of 
Scripture  contemporary  with  its  first  disciples." 
Professor  Romanes  calls  our  attention  to  the  sig- 
nal victory  for  Christianity  in  the  great  textual 
battle  of  the  last  hundred  years,  making  certain 
the  publication  of  the  Synoptics,  at  least,  within 
the  first  century.  The  early  date  of  Paul's  great 
Epistles  was,  of  course,  the  death  of  the  myth- 
ical theory.  Moreover,  myths  belong  to  the 
dawn  and  not  the  decadence  of  nations,  and  the 
Jewish  disciples,  if  the   myth-making   fancy  had 


274    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

been  brought  to  life,  would  have  created  a  Christ 
essentially  different  from  Him  who  appears  in 
the  Gospels  and  who  disapproved  so  many  of 
their  cherished  ideals. 

Now  there  are  some  things  that  all  will 
admit : — that  Christianity  is  probably  the  greatest 
fact  with  which  the  world  has  to  do ;  that  it  had 
an  origin;  that  it  originated  with  Jesus,  a  man 
springing  from  a  nation  that  was  expecting  a 
Messiah;  that  one  Saul  of  Tarsus,  a  persecutor 
of  Christians,  was  persuaded  that  Jesus  had  risen 
from  the  dead,  and  gave  his  life  to  publishing 
this  new  faith ;  that  the  Christians  so  multiplied, 
in  spite  of  attacks  on  every  hand,  that  in  the  reign 
of  Nero,  in  the  year  sixty-four,  a  great  number, 
as  Tacitus  tells  us,  were  killed  or  tortured  by 
that  monster  in  Rome;  that  in  the  year  iii, 
according  to  Pliny,  these  Christians  were  so 
numerous  in  Pontus  and  Bithynia  that  the 
heathen  altars  were  nearly  deserted,  and  that 
early  in  the  fourth  century  Christianity  became 
the  religion  of  the  Roman  Empire.  It  is  ad- 
mitted, that  the  Gospels  and  the  Acts  are  his- 
tories, giving  a  generally  truthful  account  of  the 
beginnings  of  Christianity,  leaving  out  as  dis- 
puted the  miraculous  elements.  But  the  mir- 
aculous elements  alone  are  adequate  to  account 
for  the  conquering  energy  of  the  disciple's  faith 
and  the  success  which  followed  the  tremendous 
claims  of  Jesus.  They  would  naturally  belong 
to  the  powers  and  the  mission  of  such  a  person 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  275 

as  Christ  is  represented  to  have  been.  He  cer- 
tainly claimed  to  be  the  divine  Messiah.  The 
claims  of  Buddha  and  Mohammed  were  on 
an  infinitely  lower  level.  He  asserted  super- 
natural authority.  And  how  could  He  reveal 
Himself  so  as  to  be  known  as  the  Messiah,  un- 
less by  some  supernatural  tokens,  and  how  could 
the  Apostles,  except  by  the  same  evidences, 
prove  His  Messiahship?  As  one  has  said:  "Here 
were  no  victories,  no  conquests,  no  revolutions, 
no  surprising  elevation  of  fortune,  no  achieve- 
ments of  valor,  of  strength,  or  of  policy  to  ap- 
peal to,  no  discoveries  in  any  art  or  science,  no 
great  efforts  of  learning  or  genius  to  produce. 
A  Galilean  peasant  is  announced  to  the  world  as 
the  Divine  Lawgiver.  A  young  man  of  mean 
condition,  of  a  private  and  simple  life,  and  who 
had  wrought  no  deliverance  for  the  Jewish  na- 
tion, was  declared  to  be  their  Messiah.  This, 
without  ascribing  to  Him,  at  the  same  time,  some 
proofs  of  His  mission  (and  what  other  but  super- 
natural truths  could  there  be?),  was  too  absurd  a 
claim  to  be  either  imagined  or  attempted  or 
credited."  The  system  of  truth  which  originated 
with  a  Jewish  Carpenter  and  a  few  fishermen 
could  not  have  made  its  way  to  such  wide,  early 
acceptance,  against  the  hostility  of  Jerusalem, 
Athens,  and  Rome,  against  synagogue  and  philos- 
ophic school  and  armed  antagonism,  against  all 
the  external  forces  of  imperial  civilization,  and 
against   the   obdurate  wickedness   of  the  human 


276    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

heart,  unless  it  had  been  accompanied  by  the 
signature  of  the  Almighty.  The  conquest  of 
Mohammedanism  and  Buddhism  may  be  ex- 
plained in  other  ways,  but  not  that  of  Chris- 
tianity. 

In  looking  at  the  historic  conditions  of  our 
faith  we  must  not  forget  that  these  biographies, 
which  are  the  literary  basis  of  Christianity,  give 
us  the  impression  of  truthfulness,  and  so  strong 
an  impression  that  frequently  the  best  tonic  for 
enfeebled  faith  is  to  read  and  ponder  with  rever- 
ent heart,  these  simple  and  self-evidencing  nar- 
ratives. The  Gospels  give  no  impression  that 
the  writers  were  either  weak-minded,  fanciful,  or 
untruthful.  The  Church  challenges  attention  to 
these  records.  "It  is  the  test  of  Christianity's 
legitimate  tenure,  that  it  can  encourage  free  in- 
quiry into  its  title-deeds."  These  records  were 
given  to  the  Church  in  an  age  of  civilization,  of 
clear  and  searching  inquiry;  and  the  impression 
of  truthfulness  which  the  Gospels  make  is 
always  deepened  when  one  turns  from  them  to 
read  the  legends  of  Hercules  and  Krishna,  the 
grotesque  stories  in  the  sacred  book  of  the 
Shinto,  the  confused  accounts  of  the  life  of 
Buddha,  and  the  accretion  of  myths  which  fol- 
lowed the  performances  of  mediaeval  miracle- 
working  saints  or  the  so-called  Apocryphal  Gos- 
pels, where  the  writers  give  reckless  scope  to 
their  fancies  in  ascribing  fictitious  marvels  to 
Jesus   of   Nazareth.      I    scarcely  see   how  better 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTTANITT.  277 

witnesses  of  historic  fact  could  have  been  chosen 
than  those  whom  Jesus  summoned  to  His  side 
and  trained  for  their  Hfe-mission.  "They  are 
quahfied  as  witnesses  because  free  from  all  pre- 
occupation with  ideas  and  systems;  they  were 
plain  men  who  could  receive  the  impress  of 
facts,  who  could  tell  a  simple,  plain  tale,  and 
show  by  their  lives  how  much  they  believed  it ; 
and  they  were  trained  to  be  witnesses.  Jesus 
Christ  intended  His  Gospel  to  rest  on  facts;  and 
in  correspondence  with  this  intention  the  whole 
stress  in  the  Apostolic  Church  was  laid  on  wit- 
ness." Then  remember  how  the  evidence  of  the 
four  evangelists  is  strengthened  by  the  impor- 
tant testimony  of  the  apostle  Paul,  who,  in  his 
Epistles,  which  are  earlier  than  the  Gospels,  nar- 
rates in  detail  the  various  appearances  of  Christ 
after  the  resurrection,  and  refers  to  many  of  the 
chief  facts  of  the  Gospels  as  well  known  and  uni- 
versally received  among  churches  reaching  all  the 
way  from  Italy  to  the  heart  of  Asia  Minor. 
Paul,  writing  in  the  midst  of  the  men  who  knew 
Christ  personally,  nearly  five  hundred  of  whom 
were  living  witnesses  of  the  resurrection,  whose 
names  were  known  and  who  could  be  found  and 
questioned,  this  Apostle,  in  various  literature 
which  cannot  be  disputed,  gives  his  mighty  ad- 
ditional testimony  to  the  truth  of  the  Gospel 
History. 

How  can    this    universal    faith    in    the   historic 
character  of  the  life  and  resurrection  of  Jesus  as 


278    CHRISTTANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

we  have  it,  this  faith  which   permeated  the  early 
Church,  be  explained  without  granting  the  truth 
of   the    Gospel    narrative?     A    recent  writer   has 
said   that   "several   have   tried   their  hands   at   a 
solution     of    the    hard     problem,    each    in    turn 
criticising    his    predecessor's    theory,    and    alto- 
gether  by   their   mutual    criticisms    making    the 
work  of   refuting  sceptical  views   on   this  subject 
a   comparatively    easy   task    for   the    apologist." 
On  the  eve  of  the  crucifixion  the  Church  was  virtu- 
ally annihilated.      The   disciples  were   scattered, 
fearful,  hopeless.      On   the   day  of  Pentecost  the 
Church    is  victorious,    uplifted,  having   a   world- 
victory  in    its    heart    of    hopeful    faith.      During 
these  fifty  days  "something  happened"  to  work 
the     mighty    transformation;    "something    hap- 
pened" to  turn   cowards  into  heroes,  shirks  into 
apostles;   "something  happened"  to  lift  a  com- 
pany of  timid,  heart-broken  men  and  women  into 
the  regenerators  of  mankind;  whose  lines  of  spir- 
itual  energy   have   gone   out   into  all   the   earth, 
whose  arms  of  loving  force   have  toppled   down 
ancient  systems,  girded  the  world  with  hands  of 
splendor  and  lifted  torches  of  spiritual  light  on  the 
mountains   of    Europe,    America,    India,    China, 
Japan,  Africa,   which  have  become  the  beacon- 
fires  of    a    universal    faith!     What    that    "some- 
thing" was,  no  Christian  on  the  earth  doubted 
on  the  day  of  Pentecost.      The  Church  believed 
with   all    its   heart,  and  proclaimed  with  tongues 
of    fire,    that    Jesus    had    risen    from   the   dead. 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  279 

Primitive  Christianity  cannot  be  explained  with- 
out this  behef.  Channing  has  said:  "A  history- 
received  by  a  people  as  true,  not  only  gives  us 
the  testimony  of  the  writer,  but  the  testimony 
of  the  nation  amonc^  whom  it  finds  credit." 
The  earliest  disciples,  in  the  capital  of  Judaism, 
appealed  to  the  enemies  of  Christ  for  the  truth 
of  Christ's  miracles;  and  this  appeal  was  not 
contradicted  by  the  Jews,  as  it  unquestionably 
would  have  been  had  these  miracles  been  an  in- 
vention of  a  few  followers  of  Christ.  Peter  said 
on  the  day  of  Pentecost,  within  seven  weeks 
from  the  time  of  Christ's  resurrection,  "Ye  men 
of  Israel,  hear  these  words:  Jesus  of  Nazareth, 
a  man  approved  of  God  unto  you  by  mighty 
works,  and  wonders,  and  signs,  which  God  did 
by  Him  in  the  midst  of  you,  even  as  ye  your- 
selves know." 

In  his  two  letters  to  the  Church  in  Corinth,  in 
his  letter  to  the  Church  in  Rome,  in  his  letter  to 
the  Church  in  Galatia,  Paul  calls  attention  to 
the  fact  of  Christ's  victory  over  the  grave  as  the 
central  fact  of  faith  and  of  life.  The  truth  is  that 
the  life-blood  of  every  book  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment is  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  Christ.  In  the 
four  Epistles  of  Paul  referred  to,  and  which  re- 
morseless criticism,  has  left  untouched,  letters 
written  within  about  twenty-five  years  of  the 
death  of  Christ,  letters  which  are,  in  time,  as 
near  to  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  as  we  are  to  the 
close  of  the  Franco-German  war,  Paul  communi- 


38o    CHRISriANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

cates  with  the  churches  in  Asia,  Italy,  and  Greece, 
among  whom  the  fact  of  Christ's  resurrection 
was  unchallenged.  This  is  a  part  of  the  historic 
foundation  on  which  Christendom  is  built.  It  is 
fortunate  that  men  have  tried  to  undermine  it, 
because  these  attempts  have  not  only  shown  the 
impregnability  of  our  rock,  but  they  have  called 
the  attention  of  the  Church  away  from  its 
ecclesiastical  divisions  to  Him  who  is  the  unify- 
ing factor  in  Christendom,  and  who  is  our 
strength,  and  life,  and  common  heritage.  All 
the  explanations  by  which  the  materialists  and 
rationalists  would  explain  away  this  supreme 
event,  the  various  theories  propounded  and  urged 
with  subtlety  and  ingenuity,  to  the  effect  that 
Christ  did  not  die,  but  that  His  ghastly,  emaci- 
ated body,  just  recovering  from  its  swoon,  came 
forth  on  the  third  day  to  inspire  his  stricken  fol- 
lowers and  make  them  feel  that  He  was  the 
glorious  Lord  of  Life;  or  that  His  body  was 
stolen  by  the  disciples,  who  founded  the  Church 
on  fraud ;  or  that  the  body  was  stolen  by  His 
enemies,  who  refused  to  stamp  out  the  early  faith 
in  the  resurrection,  as  they  might  easily  have 
done,  and  as,  in  their  merciless  hate,  they  cer- 
tainly would  have  done;  or  that  the  risen  Jesus 
was  only  a  fancy  created  by  the  imagination  of 
the  hysterical  Mary  Magdalene,  or  was  a  crea- 
ture of  the  faith  of  the  other  disciples,  who  felt 
that  their  hero  could  not  die, — all  these,  and 
other  theories,  do  not   explain ;  they  signally  fail 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITY.  281 

to  account  for  the  intense,  invincible,  primitive 
faith,  and  leave  the  early  history  of  the  Church 
an  unsolved  enigma.  This  may  be  said,  even 
of  the  theory  of  Keim,  who  admits  that  the 
appearances  of  Christ  were  not  hallucinations, 
and  who  claims  that  Jesus  produced,  from  His 
spiritual  state,  manifestations  which  the  Apostles 
and  others  mistook  for  bona  fide  corporeal  mani- 
festations! He  gave  them  spiritual  apparitions 
to  assure  them  that  He  was  still  alive;  sent  them 
telegrams,  as  it  were,  and  thus  cheered  them, 
and  stirred  in  them  new  hope."  Of  course, 
this  telegram  hypothesis  goes,"  as  Dr.  Bruce 
has  said,  "beyond  the  limits  of  naturalism,"  but 
the  theory  "has  the  disadvantage  of  being 
obliged  to  tamper  with  the  Gospel  narratives," 
and  besides,  it  makes  Christ  responsible  for  de- 
ceiving his  followers  into  believing  the  resurrec- 
tion a  historic  fact.  "If  the  resurrection  be  an 
unreality,  if  the  body  that  was  nailed  to  the  tree 
never  came  forth  from  the  tomb,  why  send 
messages  that  were  certain  to  cause  the  apostles, 
and  through  them,  the  whole  Christian  Church, 
to  believe  a  lie?  Truly,  this  is  a  poor  founda- 
tion to  build  Christendom  on,  a  bastard  super- 
naturalism  as  objcctional  to  unbelievers  as  the 
true  supernaturalism  of  the  Catholic  creed,  and 
having  the  additional  drawback  that  it  offers  to 
faith,  asking  for  bread,  a  stone." 

The  early  Church,  believing  with   all   its  heart 
and  soul  in  the  great  facts  of  the  Gospel,  would 


282    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

not  have  braved  and  suffered  so  much  for  a  his- 
torical uncertainty;  such  men  and  women  would 
not  have  died  for  a  guess  or  a  ghostly  vision  or 
an  idle  tale.  The  rapid  progress  and  triumph  of 
the  Church  not  only  evidenced  the  fervor  of 
their  faith,  but  indirectly  the  truth  of  the  history 
on  which  the  Church's  faith  and  life  was  founded. 
There  probably  never  was  so  unequal  a  contest 
as  that  between  Christianity  and  the  Roman 
world.  And  when  we  ask  why  Christian  men 
were  so  zealous  and  successful  in  spreading  the 
new  doctrine  which  brought  them  only  disrepute; 
why  they  had  such  self-denying  enthusiasm,  and 
were  pervaded  by  such  profound  faith  in  immor- 
tality, and  in  that  Christ  who  had  brought  life 
and  immortality  to  light ;  why  in  that  age  of 
utter  selfishness,  they  were  so  loving  and  self- 
sacrificing;  why  they  were  so  confident  in  regard 
to  the  future,  when  the  world  generally  had  be- 
come so  sceptical ;  why  they  manifested  such 
virtues,  far  above  the  men  about  them,  and  lived 
as  brethren  in  their  church-life  in  the  midst  of  a 
hate-ridden  world,  and  were  able  to  mould  at  last 
the  hard  and  cruel  Roman  Empire  to  their 
thoughts;  we  strike,  immediately,  their  faith  in 
that  wonderful  history  which  was  the  substance 
of  their  preaching,  their  belief  in  Christ's  resur- 
rection, the  supreme  evidence  of  immortality;  we 
strike  their  belief  in  a  divine  Person,  who  was 
their  risen  and  redeeming  King,  to  whom  they 
were  bound  by  a  deathless  love,  who    inspired  in 


CHARACTER    OF  CHRISTIAXITT.  283 

them  every  active  and  passive  virtue,  and  before 
whose  majesty  all  were  equal  and  all  should  be 
loving. 

Whoever,  by  his  philosophy,  denies  the  pos- 
sibility of  miracles,  not  only  begs  the  question  in 
advance,  not  only  turns  the  early  history  of  the 
Church  "into  a  batch  of  insoluble  problems," 
following  the  footsteps  of  men  who  have  tried  by 
miracles  of  interpretation  to  disprove  and  dis- 
place the  miracles  of  Jesus,  but  he  also  darkens 
and  narrows  the  sphere  of  his  own  thinking,  the 
horizon  of  his  own  hopes,  and  gradually  or  sud- 
denly robs  his  soul  of  that  divinest  conception  of 
God  which  has  ever  gladdened  and  glorified  our 
race,  a  God  revealed  in  Him  of  Nazareth.  But 
that  we  cannot  rationally  tear  out  the  miracles 
is  evident  from  the  fact  that  they  are  recorded 
with  the  same  air  of  truthfulness  and  utter  can- 
dor with  the  other  events;  they  are  a  chief  part 
of  books  in  which  the  writers,  who  are  evidently 
not  simpletons  or  frauds,  relate  many  things  to 
their  own  discredit,  how  they  contended  with 
their  Master,  how  they  quarreled,  how  they  for- 
sook their  Leader  in  His  hour  of  trouble  ;  from  the 
fact  that  when  men  invent  the  miraculous  they 
fall  into  the  silliness  of  the  Apocryphal  gospels, 
which  are  no  more  like  the  tone  of  the  true  ones 
than  the  Book  of  Mormon  is  like  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount ;  from  the  fact  that  many  of  the 
recorded  sayings  of  Christ,  which  are  evidently 
genuine,  involve  the   reality   of   the   miracles,  as 


2S4    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

where  Jesus  said,  "Go  and  tell  John  the  blind 
receive  their  sight,  the  lepers  are  cleansed,  the 
dead  are  raised  up;"  from  the  fact  that  while 
miracles  were  valued  as  signs  from  heaven,  they 
were  not  over-valued ;  from  the  fact  that  the 
Apostles  and  first  witnesses,  having  every  oppor- 
tunity to  know  the  truth  about  Jesus,  staked  and 
gave  up  their  lives  in  prolonged  and  solemn 
attestation  of  what  they  assuredly  knew ;  from 
the  fact  that  there  was  not  among  them  or 
among  the  people,  an  easy  and  universal  ten- 
dency to  believe  in  the  miraculous.  The  Apos- 
tles w^ere  slow  to  accept  the  chief  of  the  miracles, 
the  resurrection.  The  people  were  awe-struck 
by  some  of  the  miracles.  "Since  the  world  be- 
gan it  has  not  been  heard  that  any  one  opened 
the  eyes  of  one  born  blind!"  "No  man,"  said 
the  learned  and  cautious  Nicodemus,  "can  do 
these  miracles  that  Thou  doest,  except  God  be 
with  Him."  There  was  among  the  Apostles  no 
appetite  for  the  marvelous,  no  spirit  that  would 
beget  credulity,  as  is  plain  from  the  wonderful 
simplicity  and  quietness  of  their  records.  If 
they  had  been  forgers,  or  crazy  for  miracles, 
why  did  they  record  their  own  failure  to  work  a 
miracle,  and  why  not  connect  some  miracle  with 
so  marvelous  and  great  a  prophet  as  John  the 
Baptist,  the  herald  of  their  Messiah,  whose  testi- 
mony they  so  highly  valued?  We  cannot  tear 
out  the  miracles  from  the  Gospels  without  sink- 
ing the  Apostles  to  the  level  of  fools  or  deceivers, 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITV.  285 

a  conclusion  which  is  irrational,  both  from  what 
they  have  written,  from  the  lives  they  lived,  and 
from  the  incomparable  grandeur  of  the  portrait 
they  have  drawn  of  Jesus  Christ. 

A  thousand  Shakespearcs  could  not  have  im- 
agined such  a  character,  and  dupes  and  liars  could 
not  have  given  us  such  a  picture  of  a  perfect 
personality  as  shines  from  the  evangelic  pages. 
Those  men  of  practical  and  almost  prosaic  minds 
were  not  equal  to  the  work  for  which  a  hundred 
Dantes  and  Miltons  would  have  been  incom- 
petent, that  is  if  Christ  as  portrayed  in  the  Gos- 
pels, is  not  true  to  history.  That  character  was 
evidently  drawn  from  the  life,  and  this  alone  "is 
suf^cient  to  demonstrate  the  truth  of  the  Gospel 
history."  His  presence  in  it  for  ever  vindicates 
its  reality.  It  was  natural  that  such  a  being  as 
the  sinless  Christ,  who,  with  all  his  genuine  hu- 
manity, manifestly  did  not  belong  to  the  world ; 
it  was  natural  that  the  Holy  One  of  Nazareth, 
whose  touch  is  the  life  of  our  civilization  to-day, 
whose  spirit  is  the  very  breath  of  God,  should 
do  the  works  of  the  Father.  Supernatural  signs 
are  the  jewels  which  naturally  adorn  the  brow  of 
this  celestial  King.  He  who  spake  with  the  ten- 
derness, the  holiness,  and  the  authority  of  God, 
and  with  assertions  of  His  super-human  origin 
and  power,  is  to  be  believed  when  He  claims  to 
do  the  works  of  heaven. 

Therefore,  we  conclude  with   Peter,  that  "we 
did  not  follow  cunningly  devised   fables  when  we 


286    CHRISTIANITr,   THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

made  known  to  you  the  power  and  coming  of 
our  Lord  Jesus  Christ."  And  John  adds: 
"That  which  was  from  the  beginning,  that  which 
we  have  heard,  that  which  we  have  seen  with 
our  eyes,  that  which  we  beheld,  and  our  hands 
have  handled,  concerning  the  Word  of  Life 
— these  things  we  write  unto  you,"  and  the 
church,  with  firm  voice,  answers:  We  believe  in 
God  the  Father  Almighty,  Maker  of  heaven  and 
earth,  and  in  Jesus  Christ  His  only  Son,  our 
Lord,  who  was  conceived  by  the  Holy  Ghost, 
born  of  the  Virgin  Mary,  suffered  under  Pontius 
Pilate,  was  crucified,  dead,  and  buried;  He  de- 
scended into  Hades;  the  third  day  He  arose 
again  from  the  dead;  he  ascended  into  heaven, 
and  sitteth  at  the  right  hand  of  God  the  Father 
Almighty;  from  thence  he  shall  come  to  judge 
the  quick  and  the  dead.  We  believe  in  the 
Holy  Ghost,  the  Holy  Catholic  Church,  the 
Commmunion  of  Saints,  the  Forgiveness  of  sins, 
the  Resurrection  of  the  body,  and  the  Life  Ever- 
lasting." 

We  believe  that  the  forces  which  command 
the  future  of  the  world  are  already  marshalled, 
and  shall  yet  be  harmonized,  purified,  and  victori- 
ous. The  creed  of  historic  Christianity  has 
known  eighteen  hundred  years  of  discussion ;  it 
has  never  known  defeat,  and  it  does  not  purpose 
now  to  revise  its  doctrine  by  abandoning  the 
heart  and  brain  of  the  Christian  confession. 
The    Church  of    God,  built    on    the    Incarnation 


CHARACTER   OF  CHRISTIANITV.  2S7 

and  Resurrection,  and  holding  from  her  temple's 
topmost  spire  the  Cross,  has  seen  imperial  do- 
mains, and  hoary  superstitions,  and  theologies  of 
error,  and  ten  thousand  airy  speculations  disap- 
pear, while  she  steadily  expands  her  sheltering 
walls,  and  opens  her  shining  gates  to  encompass 
all  nations. 

Oh,  where  are  kings  and  empires  now 

Of  old  that  went  and  came? 
But  Lord,  thy  Church  is  praying  yet, 

A  thousand  years  the  same. 

We  mark  her  goodly  battlements, 

And  her  foundations  strong, 
And  hear  within  the  solemn  voice 

Of  her  unending  song. 

Unshaken  as  eternal  hills 

Immovable  she  stands, 
A  mountain  that  shall  fill  the  earth  — 

A  house  not  made  with  hands! 

I  am  grateful  for  the  kind  sympathy  with 
which  you  have  followed  me  over  the  mountain 
peaks  and  down  into  the  valleys  in  our  swift 
progress  through  this  course  of  Lectures,  si 
have  endeavored  to  speak  the  truth  in  love. 
While  setting  forth  the  claims  of  Christianity, 
I  have  not  intentionally  done  injustice  to  the 
teachings  of  Mohammed,  to  the  ethics  of  Con- 
fucius, nor  to  whatever  is  true  and  beautiful  in 
the  sacred  literatures  of  India.  You  will  bear  me 
witness  that  I  have  rejoiced  in  the  excellences  of 
doctrine  taught  by  the  prophets  of  many  faiths. 
This  Lectureship  has  endeavored  to  enter  sympa- 


288    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

thetically  the  heart  "of  the  tired  and  dust-stained 
pilgrim  praying  earnestly  to  the  thousand-handed 
goddess  of  mercy"  at  the  shrines  of  Japan.  It 
has  looked  for  the  true  and  good  everywhere, 
and  has  seen  in  the  less  perfect  religions  prophe- 
cies of  that  glorious  fullness  of  truth  and  grace 
found  in  the  Christian  Gospel.  I  have  com- 
pared the  kingdom  and  revelation  of  Christ  to 
the  majestic  Cathedral  of  Cologne.  If  the  great 
cathedral  of  historic  Christianity,  whose  archi- 
tecture I  have  described  to-day,  enshrines  the  Son 
of  God,  then  it  is  a  temple  which  must  cover  the 
earth.  If  Christianity,  as  revealed  in  the  Gos- 
pels, is  true,  then  it  must  become  universal. 

It  is  said  that  the  Hindu  girls  make  from  the 
shell  of  the  cocoanut  a  little  boat,  place  a  small 
lamp  and  flowers  within  it,  and  launch  it  on  the 
Ganges.  If  it  floats  out  of  sight  with  its  lamp 
still  burning,  the  omen  is  propitious:  if  it  sinks, 
the  love  of  which  it  questions  is  ill-fated. 

Float  on,  float  on,  my  haunted  bark!     Above  the  midnight 

tide, 
Bear  softly  o'er  the  waters  dark  the  hopes  that  with  thee 

glide. 
Float  on,  float  on;  thy  freight  is  flowers,  and  every  flower 

reveals 
The  dreaming  of  my  lonely  hours,  the  hope  my  spirit  feels. 

Float  on,  float  on,  thou  shining  lamp!     The  light  of  love  is 

there; 
If  lost  beneath  the  waters  deep,  that  love  must  then  despair. 
Float  on;  beneath  the  moonlight  float  the   sacred  billows 

o'er. 
Ah!  some  kind  spirit  guides  my  boat,  for  it  hath  gained  the 

shore! 


CHARACTER    OF   CHRISTIANITY.  2 89 

So  Christian  love  has  sent  out  its  boat  upon 
the  Ganges  and  upon  all  the  streams  which  glide 
by  the  mosques  and  temples  and  tombs  of  the 
land  of  the  sun.  The  lamp  of  God's  word  is 
within  that  bark.  It  has  been  tossed  on  many 
rough  waves,  it  has  seen  buried  beneath  the 
waters  many  saintly  souls ;  but  it  is  surely  guarded 
by  Him  who  held  of  old  the  seven  stars  in  His 
right  hand,  and  who  walketh  now  among  the 
seven  golden  candlesticks  of  the  churches.  It 
shall  touch  millennial  shores. 


THE    WORLD'S    PARLIAMENT    OF 
RELIGIONS. 


God  is  no  respecter  of  persons;  but  in  every  nation  he 
that  feareth  Him  and  worketh  righteousness  is  acceptable 
to  Him.    Acts  X.  35. 

Not  many  events  a  century  hence  will  be  found  to  have 
exerted  a  more  v^^ide-spread  influence  than  this  coming 
together  of  the  representatives  of  the  world's  religions. — 
President  William  R.  Harper,  D.D. 

I  can  think  of  nothing  more  impressive  than  such  an 
assemblage  of  the  representatives  of  all  the  children  of  our 
Heavenly  Father,  convened  to  tell  each  other  what  witness 
he  has  given  them  of  Himself,  what  light  He  has  afforded 
them  in  the  awful  mysteries  of  life  and  death. — Whittier. 

I  dreamed 
That  stone  by  stone  I  reared  a  sacred  fane, 
A  temple;  neither  Pagod,  Mosque,  nor  Church, 
But  loftier,  simpler,  always  open-doored 
To  every  breath  from  Heaven;  and  Truth  and  Peace 
And  Love  and  Justice  came  and  dwelt  therein. 

— Tennyson  "  Akbar's  Dream." 
The  results  of  this  gathering  will  be  more  manifold 
than  any  single  eye  can  trace;  interest  has  been  aroused, 
sympathy  evoked,  truth  brought  to  light,  devotion  quick- 
ened, and  the  immense  fact  of  the  practical  universality  of 
religion  and  the  vast  diffusion  of  certain  great  primary  ele- 
ments of  faith  has  received  a  demonstration  of  significance 
such  as  it  never  won  before. — Professor  J.  Estlin  Car- 
penter, D.D.,  Oxford. 


SEVENTH  LECTURE. 

THE    WORLD'S    PARLIAMENT    OF    RELIGIONS.* 

It  has  been  my  pleasure  to  speak  to  many 
hundreds  of  the  Native  Christians  of  India  who 
represent  in  so  large  a  measure  the  future  of  this 
wondrous  land.  When  I  remember  the  environ- 
ments of  their  lives,  the  inherited  prejudices,  the 
tyrannical  caste-customs,  the  atmosphere  of 
superstition  and  hostility,  I  regard  these  Chris- 
tian communities  as  more  wonderful  exhibitions 
of  the  power  of  God,  our  gracious  Father  and 
Creator,  than  the  majestic  heights  of  the  Hima- 
layas; and  I  deem  it  one  of  the  chief  privileges 
of  my  visit  to  India  that  I  am  able  in  any  meas- 
ure to  bring  encouragement  and  inspiration  to 
these,  my  fellow-disciples,  whose  allegiance  to 
Christ  has  often  shown  itself  heroic. 

There  is  one  theme  of  constant  and  vital  inter- 
est to  the  people  of  India  on  which  I  have  fre- 
quently spoken  in  other  cities,  and  which  is  to 
be  the  subject  of  my  remarks  to-night.  Having 
given  time  during  four  years  to  promoting,  or- 
ganizing, and   conducting  the   Parliament  of  Re- 

*An  address  before  the  Native  Christian  Conference  of 
Madras. 

293 


294    CHRISTIAXTTT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

ligions,  and  to  preparing  and  publishing  its 
proceedings,  and  having  had  occasion  and  op- 
portunity to  read  what  has  been  written  about 
that  meeting,  in  all  parts  of  the  world,  I  am  able 
to  speak  of  its  purposes,  spirit,  and  result  with 
accurate  knowledge.  It  seems  important  that 
correct  information  should  be  diffused,  since  mis- 
leading and  ridiculously  inaccurate  reports  are  in 
some  places  current.  At  the  very  outset  let  it 
be  understood  that  Christian  America,  as  repre- 
sented by  most  of  the  leading  Christian  journals, 
and  the  great  body  of  her  more  eminent  Chris- 
tian scholars,  has  approved  the  Parliament  from 
its  inception  until  now.  Nothing  would  appear 
more  absurd  to  well-informed  people  in  my  own 
land  and  in  Great  Britain  than  the  assertion  that 
churches  had  been  closed  and  Christian  faith 
shaken  by  the  advocacy  in  Western  Christen- 
dom of  the  claims  of  Oriental  faiths.  There  is 
nothing  more  grotesque  and  ridiculous  in  any  of 
the  mythologies  than  the  rumors  as  to  the  wide 
acceptance  in  America  and  England  of  Oriental 
philosophies  as  substitutes  for  Christianity.  The 
courtesy  and  curiosity  of  the  American  people 
have  been  misunderstood.  The  apostles  of  non- 
Christian  faiths  have  been  received  with  interest 
and  with  admiration,  and  they  have  done  some- 
thing to  quicken  a  desire  for  further  knowledge 
of  Eastern  modes  of  thought.  I  believe  that 
America  will  always  be  hospitable  to  persons  and 
to  ideas.    But  to  afifirm  that  American  Christianity 


UOHLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELK.IOXS.     295 

has  been  shaken  by  the  Eastern  speakers  at  the 
Parhament  of  ReHgions  is  as  absurdly  incredible 
to  every  one  who  knows,  as  to  say  that  a  child's 
hand  has  pushed  back  the  current  of  the  Ganges. 
Almost  a  half-million  new  members  last  year 
espoused  the  cause  of  Christ  in  the  Protestant 
churches  of  the  United  States.  The  progress  of 
the  Christian  faith  in  America  has  been  as  marked 
as  ever  before.  And  the  interest  in  foreign 
missions  and  the  willingness  to  give  were  never 
greater.  And  I  have  yet  to  hear  that,  notwith- 
standing the  recent  revival  of  Hinduism,  Chris- 
tian progress  in  India  has  been  less  marked  than 
formerly.  I  believe,  with  one  of  the  Arcot 
missionaries,  that  the  revival  of  Hinduism  is  "a 
hopeful  rather  than  a  discouraging  sign."  Spir- 
itual lethargy  ''has  at  last  yielded  to  the  power- 
ful influence  of  Christianity,  and  it  is  only 
natural  that  waking  from  their  long  sleep  they 
should  first  turn  to  the  old  religion  to  satisfy 
their  spiritual  wants."  I  have  believed,  and  I 
am  glad  to  find  my  faith  shared  by  so  many  mis- 
sionaries, that  we  should  joyfully  and  thankfully 
recognize  all  elements  of  truth  and  goodness  dis- 
coverable in  Hinduism,  Buddhism,  and  Islam. 
The  sympathetic  method  of  approach  is  Pauline, 
— wise,  necessary,  and  fruitful  of  best  results. 

The  Parliament  of  Religions  should  be  looked 
at  with  no  narrow  or  one-sided  vision.  It  should 
not  be  judged  solely  from  what  we  deem  the 
accuracy   or  inaccuracy,    the   worthiness   or    the 


296    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

Linworthiness,  of  the  representation  made  in  Chi- 
cago by  the  advocate  of  that  particular  non- 
Christian  faith  in  which  we  are  most  interested. 
It  should  be  considered  in  a  large  way,  with  a 
full  knowledge  of  its  generous  and  lofty  pur- 
poses, its  noble  constituency  made  up  of  men 
and  women  of  many  nations,  the  full  reports  of 
its  public  proceedings,  and  a  wide  acquaintance 
with  its  chief  results. 

The  Parliament  of  Religions  was  not  like  the 
Emperor  Asoka's  conference,  a  meeting  of  In- 
dian Buddhists  only  ;  it  was  not  like  the  Emperor 
Akbar's  little  debating  society,  where  rival 
priests  of  several  faiths  contended  before  him, 
like  mediaeval  knights,  in  no  spirit  of  fellowship 
and  fraternity,  each  anxious  for  an  imperial  ver- 
dict in  his  favor.'  The  Parliament  was  the  first 
meeting  in  history  where  the  representatives  of 
the  world's  chief  religions,  coming  from  many 
lands,  conferred  together  in  a  great  public  assem- 
bly, with  full  liberty  to  utter  their  deepest 
thoughts  and  convictions  with  the  assurance  of  a 
calm  and  sympathetic  hearing.  The  objects  pro- 
posed for  this  meeting  by  those  who  conducted 
it,  were  so  large  and  generous  as  to  win  the 
favor  of  thousands  of  the  leading  minds  among 
many  nations  and  many  faiths.  Chief  Rabbi 
Adler,  of  Great  Britain,  suggested  the  words  of 
the  prophet  Micah,  as  the  motto  for  the  meet- 
ing, "Have  we   not   all   one   Father?     Hath  not 

'  Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  Note  i. 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  REL/d/OXS.     297 

one  God  created  us?"  The  Christian  scholars 
who  co-operated  with  the  Parhament,  often 
quoted  the  words  of  the  Apostle  Peter:  "I  per- 
ceive that  God  is  no  respecter  of  persons,  but  in 
every  nation  he  that  feareth  God  and  worketh 
righteousness  is  acceptable  to  Him."  Christian 
theologians  of  wide  knowledge,  beholding  the 
elements  of  good  in  all  religions,  remembered 
the  declaration  made  in  the  Fourth  Gospel,  that 
Christ  is  the  original  light,  enlightening  every 
man  that  cometh  into  the  world.  We  believe 
that  God  is  the  God,  not  only  of  one  people, 
but  of  all  peoples;  that  He  is  the  loving  Father 
of  all  mankind;  and  that  His  children,  more  or 
less  enlightened,  should  live  together,  and  there- 
fore have  the  privilege  of  meeting  together  as 
brethren.  Those  of  us  who  devoutly  hold  to 
the  supremacy  and  sufificiency  of  Christianity, 
the  Christianity  of  Christ,  took  for  our  guide  the 
courteous  and  sympathetic  spirit  of  the  Apostle 
Paul  when  he  addressed  the  non-Christian  think- 
ers of  Athens. 

Among  the  objects  proposed  for  the  Parlia- 
ment were  these:  To  deepen  the  spirit  of  human 
brotherhood  without  fostering  any  temper  of  in- 
differentism ;  to  show  men  what  are  the  com- 
mon truths  of  different  religions;  to  set  forth 
the  distinctive  truths  of  each ;  to  inquire  what 
light  one  religion  may  throw  upon  another;  to 
indicate  the  foundations  of  theism  and  the  rea- 
sons for  faith   in   immortality;   and  to  strengthen 


298    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  forces  adverse  to  materialism.  Here  was 
surely  a  large  field  into  which  Christianity  might 
enter  with  joyful  and  exultant  confidence.  It 
is  no  wonder  that  with  such  ideas  and  purposes 
the  organizers  of  the  Congress  secured  the  ad- 
hesion of  many  of  the  foremost  men  of  Christen- 
dom, including  Christian  statesmen,  like  Mr. 
Gladstone,  leading  divines  of  all  Christian  na- 
tions, missionaries  and  missionary  secretaries  of 
high  repute,  Christian  poets  like  Tennyson  and 
Whittier,  and  many  eminent  ecclesiastics,  in- 
cluding the  Roman  Catholic  hierarchy  of  Amer- 
ica, and  twenty-three  Bishops  of  the  Anglican 
Communion.'  With  these  ideas  and  feelings  the 
promoters  of  this  great  religious  council  toiled  on 
year  after  year,  finding  helpers  in  nearly  all 
lands,  and  nowhere  more  earnest  and  generous- 
hearted  friends  than  in  India,  among  men  be- 
longing to  different  Confessions.  On  the  eleventh 
of  September,  1893,  our  labors  and  hopes  reached 
their  fulfillment.  With  representatives  of  ten 
religions  gathered  beneath  one  roof,  and  with  a 
Catholic  Cardinal  repeating  the  universal  prayer 
of  the  world's  Saviour,  the  Parliament  opened. 
It  was  indeed  a  meeting  of  brotherhood,  where 
"the  Brahman  forgot  his  caste,  and  the  Catholic 
was  chiefly  conscious  of  his  catholicity;"  and 
where  in  the  audience  "the  variety  of  interests, 
faiths,  ranks,  and  races  was  as  great  as  that  found 
on  the  platform."  As  the  representatives  of 
^Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  Note  2. 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     299 

China,  Japan,  Russia,  Germany,  Hindustan, 
Sweden,  and  Norway,  Greece,  France,  Africa,  the 
United  States,  and  the  all-clasping  Empire  of 
Great  Britain,  from  England  to  India  and  New 
Zealand,  uttered  their  thoughts  and  feelings, 
multitudes  entered  anew  into  the  spirit  of  the 
Nazarene  Prophet,  who  seemed  always  to  include 
the  whole  world  in  His  purpose  and  affection. 
Nearly  all  great  events  to-day  are  the  result  of 
the  ages  which  have  preceded,  but  the  special 
preparations  for  this  meeting  were  the  almost  uni- 
versal prevalence  of  Christian  missions,  the  rise 
and  study  of  comparative  religion,  the  wide  use 
of  the  English  language  making  such  a  confer- 
ence possible,  international  facilities  for  travel, 
the  attractive  opportunity  afforded  by  a  World's 
Exposition,  much  hard  work,  extending  over 
more  than  three  years,  and  ample  religious  free- 
dom in  America.  So-called  liberal  Christians 
naturally  looked  upon  it  as  one  of  their  triumphs, 
but  they  alone  could  not  have  gained  the  co-op- 
eration of  historic  Christendom.  Liberal-minded 
Jews  saw  in  it  the  fulfilment  of  the  prophecy 
that  the  knowledge  of  Jehovah  should  cover  the 
earth,  but  Judaism  alone  could  not  have  achieved 
a  convention  of  Christians.  The  Brahmo-Somaj 
of  India  regarded  the  Parliament  as  fulfilling  the 
ideas  of  the  New  Dispensation,^  but  the  Brahmo- 
Somaj  would  have  been  unable  to  draw  together 
the  representatives  of  the  great  faiths.  No 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  Note  3. 


300    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Christian  missionary  society  could  have  achieved 
the  ParHament,  for  the  fear  of  aggressive  propa- 
gandism  would  have  kept  out  the  non-Christian 
world.  No  ecclesiastical  body  in  Christendom, 
whether  Catholic,  Greek,  Anglican,  or  Lutheran, 
could  have  assembled  the  Parliament.  No 
kingly  and  imperial  government  in  which  the 
church  and  state  are  united  could  have  gathered 
it,  and  no  republican  government,  where  church 
and  state  are  separated,  would  have  deemed  it  a 
part  of  its  office  to  summon  it.  But,  as  one 
element  of  an  international  exposition,  and  con- 
trolled by  a  generous-minded  and  representative 
committee  under  no  ecclesiastical  dictation, 
appealing  in  the  spirit  of  fraternity  to  high- 
minded  individuals,  the  Parliament  was  possible, 
and  was  actualized. 

I  believe  that  the  forces  which,  working 
through  ages,  culminated  in  this  conference  of 
the  world's  faiths  are  the  intellectual  and  spir- 
itual movements  which  make  the  Gulf  Stream  of 
history.  These  forces  come,  as  I  believe,  from 
the  Bible,  which  is  the  text-book  of  a  universal 
religion;  they  come  from  the  Christ,  the  Unifier 
of  Humanity,  who  offered  Himself  for  the  life  of 
the  whole  world ;  these  forces  are  linked  with 
that  growing  spirit  of  brotherhood  which  is 
breaking  down  the  walls  of  caste  and  of  national 
antipathy.  And  when  on  that  September  morn- 
ing the  hopes  and  toils  of  years  were  realized, 
and    the    President     of    the     World's    Congress 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     301 

Auxiliary  and  the  President  of  the  Columbian 
Exposition,  accompanied  by  a  Catholic  Car- 
dinal of  America,  and  a  Catholic  Archbishop 
from  New  Zealand,  and  a  Greek  Archbishop 
from  Zante,  by  representatives  of  the  imperial 
government  of  China,  by  Buddhist  priests  and 
scholars  from  Ceylon  and  Japan,  by  representa- 
tives of  the  Brahmo-Somaj  of  India,  by  mis- 
sionaries of  the  Orient,  by  Mohammedans,  Hin- 
dus, and  Jains,  by  a  Russian  and  an  African 
prince,  by  a  high  priest  of  Shintoism,  and  by  a 
score  of  the  representative  men  and  women  of 
America,  entered  the  hall  of  Columbus  and 
joined  in  an  act  of  common  worship  to  Almighty 
God;   when  the  immense  assembly  sang 

Before  Jehovah's  awful  throne, 
Ye  nations  bow  with  sacred  joy; 

Know  that  the  Lord  is  God  alone; 
He  can  create,  and  He  destroy 

thousands  realized  that  they  were  present  at  a 
never-to-be-forgotten  event  in  human  history. 
A  Christian  divine  and  philosopher  has  written: 
"It  was  the  greatest  experience  of  my  life.  I 
never  expect  a  repetition  of  the  sight  and  the 
thrill  of  that  opening  morning  hour  until  I  stand 
before  the  throne  above."*  For  seventeen  days 
the  Parliament  continued.  One  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  people  attended  its  sessions.  It 
was  full  of  the  highest  religious  enthusiasm  from 
first  to  last.  At  times  the  scenes  were  Pente- 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  VH,  Note  4. 


302     CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

costal.  Principal  Grant,  of  Queen's  University, 
Kingston,  Canada,  writes:  "The  spirit  of  the 
Parliament  of  Religions  was  the  spirit  of  Jesus 
Christ.  As  'the  spectator  of  all  time  and  of  all 
existence,'  He  alone  perfectly  realized  Plato's 
ideal  of  a  philosopher.  He  saw  in  vision  all 
nations  gathered  before  His  tribunal.  Looking 
back  on  all  the  prophets.  He  says,  'They  wrote  of 
me.'  Looking  forward,  He  says,  'I  am  with  you 
to  the  end  of  the  world.'  He  always  occupied 
that  high  point  of  view,  the  best  of  us  only  for 
a  moment.  But  on  the  morning  the  Parlia- 
ment opened  and  the  representatives  of  human- 
ity met  together  to  tell  one  another  what  God 
had  done  for  their  souls,  or  how  they  had  been 
groping  for  Him,  with  the  sole  object  that  all 
should  share  as  brothers  in  the  rich  inheritance 
of  His  grace,  we  stood  for  some  hours  on  the 
Mount  of  Vision.  What  an  object-lesson  to  the 
world  that  the  spiritual  is  the  highest,  or  rather 
the  only  possible,  interpretation  of  the  universe." 
The  Parliament,  through  its  literature,  has 
done  something  to  widen  the  world's  interest  in 
universal  religion.  What  study  should  broaden 
the  bounds  of  intellectual  and  moral  sympathy 
like  this?  Should  it  not  give  to  the  heart  an 
expansion  like  that  which  astronomy  has  given 
to  the  brain?  We,  ourselves,  are  heirs  of  all 
that  has  been ;  we  feel  the  touch  of  hands  which 
became  dust  when  Nineveh  was  destroyed,  and 
hear    the    sound    of    pathetic    voices    that    were 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     303 

stilled  before  the  Argive  keels  grated  on  the 
shores  of  Ilium  or  the  Aryan  races  made  their 
way  to  the  plains  of  India.  The  sccptered  spirits 
of  the  Past  rule  us  from  urns  older  than  the 
Druidic  circles  of  Stonehenge,  or  the  rock-hewn 
temples  of  Elephanta,  from  urns  as  ancient  as 
the  burial-places  of  the  Egyptian  dead. 

And  the  study  of  religion  in  its  entirety  should 
be  a  mighty  re-enforcement  to  faith.  The 
spiritual  facts  and  problems,  in  their  majesty  and 
universality,  must  awe  the  careless  mind  into 
reverence  and  rebuke  the  shallow  skepticism, 
which  dismisses  the  greatest  fact  of  man's  de- 
velopment as  a  baseless  superstition.  History 
itself  is  an  unsolved  problem  without  God,  who 
is  the  interpreter  as  well  as  the  director  of  human 
progress.  If  we  leave  out  the  Divine  Provi- 
dence, what  can  it  be  but  an  evolution  with  no 
eternal  intelligence,  no  infinite  energy,  no  all- 
wise  and  fore-seeing  purpose  back  of  it?  And 
surely  history  reaches  not  its  highest  worth  until 
it  rises  to  God.  Some  of  its  chief  records  must 
be  erased  if  we  omit  the  names  of  Abraham  and 
Moses,  of  David,  Isaiah,  and  Socrates,  of  Paul 
and  John,  of  Confucius  and  Buddha  and  Mo- 
hammed, of  Constantine  and  Athanasius,  of 
Charlemagne  and  Bernard,  of  Luther  and  Crom- 
well, and  the  mighty  muster-roll  of  the  sages, 
prophets  and  heroes  of  faith.  If  religion  is  sim- 
ply a  fading  superstition,  how  does  it  happen 
that  it  maintains  its  hold  and  makes  its  swiftest 


304    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

progress  in  an  age  of  scientific  knowledge,  like 
our  own?  Mr.  Kidd  informs  us  that  there  is  no 
tendency  whatever  to  eliminate  the  super-rational 
element  from  religions.  One  who  was  acquainted 
with  the  British  Association  for  the  Advance- 
ment of  Science  under  forty-one  different  presi- 
dents, said  of  them,  after  examining  their  re- 
ligious positions,  that  "The  figures  indicate  that 
religious  faith,  rather  than  unbelief,  has  character- 
ized the  leading  men  of  the  Association."  And 
a  well-known  expounder  of  evolution  has  written 
that  science,  "instead  of  robbing  the  world  of 
God  has  done  more  than  all  the  philosophies  and 
natural  theologies  of  the  past  to  sustain  and 
enrich  the  theistic  conception." 

The  Parliament  gave  mankind  the  first  oppor- 
tunity of  studying  religion,  not  in  its  fragments, 
but  in  its  entirety,  as  represented  in  one  historic 
assemblage.  The  impression  which  it  made  and 
is  making  on  the  unbelieving  and  secular  world 
is  salutary.  The  Columbian  Exposition,  which 
accentuated  the  material  glories  of  modern  civili- 
zation, needed  the  Parliament  of  Religions  to 
bring  the  human  mind  back  to  the  great  world 
of  the  Spirit.  Many  regretfully  remember  that 
the  architectural  splendors  of  the  Columbian 
Fair  have  nearly  all  vanished.  But  the  Parlia- 
ment of  Religions  has  just  begun  to  live.  As 
one  has  said:  "It  fitted  into  the  growing  con- 
sciousness of  Christianity  and  the  race.  It  has 
become    one    of    the    milestones    in    humanity's 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     305 

progress."  "In  a  quite  unexampled  way, '  \ 
writes  President  Warren,  of  the  Boston  Uni- 
versity, "it  helped,  if  it  did  not  force  every  body 
of  religionists  in  the  world  to  come  to  a  sharper 
consciousness  of  the  defects  and  weaknesses  of 
its  own  system,  so  far  as  it  is  at  present  actual- 
ized. This  was  a  gain  to  all,  and  especially  a 
gain  to  the  cause  of  spiritual  ideals  the  world 
over."  One  of  the  acutest  philosophical  think- 
ers of  America,  Professor  John  Bascom,  has 
written:  "No  religious  faith  can  be  perfectly 
understood  by  its  several  items  of  belief  alone. 
We  must  understand  the  hold  which  a  belief  has 
on  the  minds  of  those  who  have  thoroughly  ab- 
sorbed it.  It  is  from  this  point  of  view  that  a 
Parliament  of  Religions  becomes  so  instructive. 
It  brings  together  those  who  can  offer  in  their 
most  vital  forms  the  faiths  of  the  world,  and  so 
enables  us  to  measure  the  spiritual  forces  opera- 
tive among  men."  "The  Parliament, "  writes 
Professor  Bruce,  of  Glasgow,  "may  help  to  dis- 
pel pessimistic  ideas  of  ethnic  religions,  and 
suggest  the  desirableness  of  conducting  mission 
work  in  the  sympathetic  spirit  of  the  Pauline 
thought,  'God  not  far  from  every  one  of  us'." 

An  American  missionary  in  Constantinople 
has  truly  described  the  idea  which  pervaded  the 
Congress  as  this:  "That  every  form  and  develop- 
ment of  religious  faith  and  cultus  should  have 
a  candid  hearing,  be  understood,  and  its  adher- 
ents treated  with  respect,  courtesy,  and  affection; 


3o6    CHRISTTAN'ITr,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

also  that  Christianity  should  be  choked  down  no 
man's  throat,  but  that  all  men  should  be  invited 
to  receive  it  for  their  good,  intelligently  invited 
to  an  intelligent  reception." 

Professor  Thayer,  of  Harvard  University, 
writes:  "The  very  conception  of  such  a  gather- 
ing as  the  Parliament  is  a  product  of  the  Christian 
Religion.  It  could  hardly  have  originated  under 
any  other  faith.  So  far  from  involving  peril  to 
a  genuine  and  intelligent  believer  in  Christianity, 
it  affords  him  the  readiest  help  in  appreciating 
the  greatness  of  his  Christian  inheritance.  Only 
by  a  comparison  can  superiority  be  discovered. 
Only  by  comparison  can  the  latent  resources  of 
truth,  fellowship,  of  service,  resident  in  the  Gos- 
pel, come  to  recognition.  Only  by  learning  the 
best  about  the  ethnic  faiths,  can  the  Christian 
missionary  show  how  much  that  is  better  than 
their  best  he  has  to  offer.  The  headshakings  of 
over-timid  believers  make  one  long  for  a  repe- 
tition of  Peter's  vision  and  Paul's  sermon;  that 
the  Church  may  be  taught  once  more  that  there 
is  something  commendable  even  in  heathen  re- 
ligiosity. Such  lessons  will  no  more  chill  mis- 
sionary zeal  in  the  nineteenth  century  than  they 
did  in  the  first." 

We  are  conscious  that  vast  progress  in  the 
education  of  humanity  has  glorified  the  last  hun- 
dred years.  Men  have  come  to  a  broader  con- 
ception of  human  rights  and  duties.  The  indi- 
vidual is  more  highly  regarded,  and,  at  the  same 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     307 

time,  a  false  and  selfish  individualism  is  rejected. 
Divided  and  scattered  peoples  of  one  race  have 
been  brought  into  national  unity,  and  the  nations 
which  make  up  Western  Christendom  have  com- 
bined for  the  suppression  of  great  evils  like  the 
slave-trade.  Men  are  taking  the  whole  globe 
into  their  minds  and  studies  and  plans.  The 
age  of  isolation  is  passing  away.  International 
expositions  have  helped  to  break  down  the  bar- 
riers of  ignorance,  antipathy,  and  prejudice. 
How  the  bounds  of  fraternity  have  been  en- 
larged !  Humanity,  though  sundered  by  oceans 
and  languages,  and  widely  differing  forms  of 
religion,  is,  after  all,  a  unit.  The  literatures  of 
the  great  historic  faiths  are  more  and  more 
studied  in  the  spirit  which  would  employ  only 
the  agencies  of  light  and  love.  Those  of  us  who 
believe  that  we  cherish  a  faith  which  has  just 
claims  to  universalism,  which  gathers  into  itself 
all  the  elements  of  truth  and  power  which  lie 
scattered  and  largely  ineffective  in  other  re- 
ligions, are  learning  that  the  best  propagandism 
is  that  which  has  love,  tolerance,  and  sympathy 
at  the  heart  of  it. 

Professor  James  Orr,  of  Edinburgh,  has  writ- 
ten:  "I  cannot  imagine  that  anything  but  good 
can  come  from  the  appearance  of  the  repre- 
sentatives of  the  great  religions  of  the  world  on 
a  free  platform,  with  full  liberty  to  each  to  state 
its  views  and  claims  on  the  homage  of  mankind, 
provided  it  be  understood  that  there  is  no  neces- 


3oS    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

sary  abating  on  the  part  of  any,  of  what  may  be 
held    to    be    its    exclusive    title    to    acceptance. 
Christianity  should,  least  of  all,  shrink  from  such 
an  ordeal    and    should  welcome   the  opportunity 
of  a  world-wide  audience."      It  was  the  spirit  of 
fraternity  which  succeeded   in  bringing  together, 
in    1893,    such    widely    separated    exponents    of 
religion.      "Enemies  simply  met  and  discovered 
that  they  were  brothers  who  had  one  Father  in 
heaven."     To  dwell  on  the  deep,  tender  feelings 
awakened  by  the  presence   at   the  Parliament  of 
the  truth-seekers   of   the   Orient,  earnest,  heart- 
hungry,  believing  that  they  had   much  to  teach 
as  well   as   something  to   learn,  their  "faces   set 
toward  God,  and  with  some  message  from  God;" 
to  recall  the  emotions  awakened  during  the  great 
opening   and    closing   hours   of   the    Parliament, 
would   be  to  indulge   in  what  many  would  deem 
a  sentimental  rhapsody ;   but   it   is   not   rhapsody 
to  say  that  "the  age  of  isolation  and  hatred  has 
passed,  and  the  age   of  toleration   and  scientific 
comparison   has   come."     Kindlier  feelings  were 
certainly    engendered     at     the    Parliament,    and 
many  who  looked   upon  this  meeting  as  a  noble 
humanitarian  measure  believe,  that  by  it  preju- 
dices were  removed  and  certain  results  to  civiH- 
zation  made  possible.   Without  concession,  with- 
out any  attempt  to  treat    all   religions  as  equally 
meritorious,    without    any    compromise    of    any 
system   of    faith   and  worship,   with    no    idea  of 
finding  or  founding  any  new  world-religion,  with 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     309 

equal  freedom  gladly  accorded  to  all  races  and 
both  sexes — the  sessions  of  the  Parliament  con- 
tinued in  practically  unbroken  harmony.  There 
was  much  significance  to  human  brotherhood  in 
the  daily  recital  of  the  Lord's  Prayer,  though 
the  unity  of  the  Parliament  was  that  of  spirit 
rather  than  creed. ^  If  this  meeting  simply 
effected  a  wider  diffusion  of  brotherliness,  it  de- 
serves, as  the  London  Daily  Telegraph  has  said, 
"a  place  among  the  notable  events  of  our  age." 
It  was  certainly  a  protest  against  the  exclusive- 
ness  of  feeling,  the  ignorant  pride,  the  ecclesi- 
astical aloofness,  and  the 'dogmatic  haughtiness 
which  often  prevail. 

The  world  will  not  soon  forget  how  the  vene- 
rated Dr.  Schaff  declared  his  resolution  to  speak 
at  the  Parliament  a  last  word  in  favor  of  Chris- 
tian unity.  "He  was  a  prophet,"  writes  Pro- 
fessor Comba,  from  Rome,  "for  this  word  of  his 
was  his  swan  song. ' '  One  of  the  chief  ideas 
which  the  Parliament  made  luminous  was  a  re- 
united Christendom,  the  preparation  for  a  Chris- 
tianized world.  Since  all  the  religions  found,  as 
Castelar  has  said,  "a  common  ground  in  Chris- 
tianity," and  since  inevitably  the  best  religion 
must  come  to  the  foreground,  may  we  not  look 
to  see  the  lines  of  human  progress  centering 
more  and  more  in  Christ? 

It  has  often  been  remarked  that  little  sectarian- 
ism   was    preached    at    the    Parliament.      There 

*  Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  Note  5. 


3IO    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Christendom  proclaimed  its  Master.  Inevitably 
this  meeting,  which  furnished  the  prophecy  of  a 
reunited  church,  has  had  large  effect  on  many 
minds.  Discussions  of  reunion  have  been  increas- 
ingly rife.  Archbishop  Keane  says  that  Ameri- 
cans are  over-eager  for  speedy  results,  and  he  is 
almost  content  with  saying  that  "the  Parliament 
accomplished  itself."  But  facts  lead  to  results 
in  the  world  of  the  spirit.  Feelings  are  changed, 
and  then  convictions.  "The  solemn  charge 
which  the  Parliament  preaches  to  all  true  be- 
lievers is  a  return  to  the  primitive  unity  of  Chris- 
tians as  a  condition  precedent  to  the  conversion 
of  the  world."  With  this  faith  in  their  hearts, 
men  are  active  along  various  lines.  The  results 
may  be  far  off,  but  they  are  certain. 

But  to  me,  one  of  the  chief  results  of  the  Par- 
liament relates  to  Christian  missions.  While 
modifying  some  popular  views  of  the  Oriental 
faiths,  it  is  promoting  a  new  and  humaner  inter- 
est in  foreign  missions  by  making  the  ethnic  sys- 
tems more  real  and  also  more  definite  to  many 
minds,  by  showing  Christians  that  these  faiths 
are  far  from  dead,  though  they  may  have  little 
life-giving  power  over  their  adherents;  by  set- 
ting before  the  Christian  world  the  magnitude  of 
the  task  that  it  has  undertaken;  by  teaching 
that  it  must  make  its  swifter  and  wider  advances 
in  the  future  by  a  better  understanding  and  a 
larger  sympathy,  rather  than  by  contemptuous 
hostility  and  bigoted  exclusiveness.      No  intelli- 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     31 1 

gent  believer  in  Christian  missions  has  had  his 
faith  shaken  by  the  stories,  some  of  them  almost 
fairy  stories,  which  two  or  three  of  the  delegates 
to  the  Parliament  related.  No  phenomenon  of 
the  century  has,  on  the  whole,  been  more  re- 
markable than  the  Christian  uprising  in  Europe 
and  America,  to  give  the  Gospel  to  all  lands, 
and  nothing  has  given  me  more  satisfaction  in 
the  work  which  I  endeavored  to  do  for  the  glory 
of  God  through  this  Parliament,  than  the  warm 
approval  coming  from  scores  of  leading  mission- 
ary scholars. 

We  welcomed  the  best  which  the  non-Chris- 
tian religions  could  say  for  themselves.  There 
was  an  able  delegation  of  Buddhist  priests, 
there  were  eloquent  representatives  of  the  Brah- 
mo-Samaj ,  there  were  scores  of  able  expounders  of 
Judaism,  there  were  excellent  papers  read  in  praise 
of  Parsiism  and  Tauism,  there  were  speeches  in 
eulogy  of  Islam,  there  was  an  extremely  elabo- 
rate and  learned  exposition  of  Confucianism, 
there  were  papers  on  Hinduism  by  orthodox 
Hindus  who  could  not  be  present,  and  there  was 
a  very  interesting  and  eloquent  oration  on  Hin- 
duism by  one  who  was  able  to  address  the  Par- 
liament in  person — an  oration  which  has  had 
many  echoes  and  many  criticisms.  But  whoever 
takes  pains  to  read  the  proceedings  of  the  Parlia- 
ment will  discover  that  the  meeting  "was  a  great 
Christian  demonstration  with  a  non-Christian 
section  which  added  color  and  picturesque  effect. 


312    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-REIJGION. 

The  Parliament  was  distinctively  Christian  in  its 
spirit,  conceptions,  prayers,  doxologies,  benedic- 
tions, and  in  its  prevailing  language,  arguments, 
and  faith.  'Only  Christianity  proclaimed  itself 
the  missionary  and  absolute  religion  with  the 
world  for  its  field.  No  Christian  struck  his 
colors  nor  allowed  himself  to  be  compromised  by 
the  presence  of  men  of  other  faiths." 

I  have  the  widest  possible  acquaintance  with 
the  effects  of  that  meeting  on  American  Chris- 
tianity ;  and  I  know  that  it  was  very  generally 
felt  and  said  by  Christian  ministers,  journalists, 
and  teachers,  that  the  Christianity  of  Christ  dis- 
played its  glorious  supremacy,  its  peerless  char- 
acter from  first  to  last,  and  some  went  so  far  as 
to  af^rm  that  the  non-Christian  religions  would 
never  be  willing  to  appear  again  in  a  great  world- 
congress,  and  show  their  little  tapers  by  the  side 
of  Christianity's  solar  orb.  My  own  conviction 
was  strong  from  the  beginning,  and  grew  stronger 
with  the  progress  of  the  Parliament,  that  the 
best  which  the  non-Christian  faiths  could  say  for 
themselves  would  only  make  more  conspicuous 
the  supereminence  of  Christ,  Such  I  believe, 
was  the  conviction  of  every  Christian  missionary 
who  took  part  in  the  Parliament.  The  published 
proceedings  of  the  meeting  were  described  to  me 
by  a  leading  student  of  Comparative  Theology 
as  one  of  the  best  books  in  recent  years  on  the 
evidences  of  Christianity.      It  is  commended  to 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT   OF  RELIGIONS.     313 

Christian  theological  students  as  such.  The 
spirit,  the  prayers,  hymns,  and  main  arguments 
of  this  Congress  were  Christian.  When,  at  the 
closing  meeting,  one  speaker  ventured  to  sug- 
gest that  no  religion  should  henceforth  seek  to 
make  converts  of  the  others,  the  strange  remark 
received  applause  from  only  one  person.  That 
great  audience,  at  the  closing  session,  was  thrilled 
by  the  Hallelujah  Chorus  and  the  prophecy 
which  was  sung,  "The  kingdoms  of  this  world 
shall  become  the  kingdom  of  our  Lord  and  of 
His  Christ,"  seemed  to  them  more  certain  than 
ever  to  be  realized.  After  the  final  meeting,  the 
vice-president  of  a  leading  foreign  missionary 
society  sent  to  me  his  thanks  for  the  services 
which  I  had  rendered  to  Christianity,  as  he  be- 
lieved, by  the  Parliament  of  Religions.  I  have 
never  heard  of  a  single  Christian  minister  who 
was  disturbed  in  his  faith  or  who  gave  up  his 
work  on  account  of  the  Parliament.  But  I  do 
know  that  Christianity  in  America  has  made 
steady  and  strong  and  rapid  advances  in  the 
last  three  years,  that  willingness  to  give  to  for- 
eign missions  has  been  as  great  as  ever,  and  I  do 
know  that  the  forms  of  Oriental  speculation  have 
scarcely  made  a  ripple  on  the  deep  surface  of  our 
Western  life.  When  the  Parliament  closed,  I, 
with  others,  affirmed  that  it  would  give  a  new 
impetus  to  Christian  missions.  Mr.  Mozoomdar 
said :  "  I  regard  Christ  as  an  essential  factor  in 
the   future   of   India;"  and   we  who   have   been 


314    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

trained  in  Christian  lands  agree  with  Christians 
here  that  Christ  is  the  essential  factor  in  India's 
coming  regeneration.  The  Parliament's  logical 
outcome,  as  Dr.  Joseph  Cook  has  written,  will 
be  the  "exaltation  of  Christianity  as  the  Sun, 
compared  with  which  all  alien  faiths  are  only 
candles." 

"The  Parliament,"  says  Mr.  Slater,  of  Banga- 
lore, "cannot  fail  to  broaden  the  thoughts  of  all 
reflecting  Christians  and  influence  for  good  the 
spirit  of  foreign  missions.  It  must  tell,  and  has 
already  told,  in  the  direction  of  greater  courtesy 
and  wider  toleration  and  fraternity."  He  also 
says  that  the  Parliament  shows  conclusively  that 
Christianity  holds  the  future  in  its  hand.  The 
venerated  Dr.  Cyrus  Hamlin  has  pronounced 
this  effort  to  bring  together  all  the  religions  of 
the  world  on  the  common  plane  of  the  brother- 
hood of  man  a  "noble  humanitarian  measure." 
"Much  good  has  already  resulted,"  says  Dr. 
Wherry,  for  twenty  years  a  Presbyterian  mission- 
ary in  India,  "and  more  good  will  result  in  the 
future."  "The  Parliament,"  says  that  St.  Paul 
among  Syrian  missionaries,  Dr.  Henry  H.  Jes- 
sup,  "has  awakened  thought,  stimulated  investi- 
gation, stirred  up  criticism,  given  light  where 
light  was  needed,  shown  the  weakness  and  im- 
potence of  the  non-Christian  systems,  given 
Christianity  an  opportunity  to  show  its  supreme 
excellence,  and  brought  the  Church  of  Christ 
face   to    face  with    those  who  were   afar   off   and 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     315 

almost  unknown.  Christian  missions  have  found 
new  justification  and  a  new  quickening."  "I 
believe,"  says  Dr.  Dennis,  of  Syria,  "that  the 
Parliament  will  be  for  the  establishment  of  Chris- 
tianity." And  that  noble  missionary  scholar, 
Dr.  Post,  writes  his  conviction  that  "the  out- 
come of  our  Parliament  will  be  for  the  further- 
ance of  the  Gospel."  "The  Church  of  Christ," 
says  Dr.  De  Forest,  of  Japan,  "is  now  on  a  bet- 
ter basis  for  the  intelligent  prosecution  of  mis- 
sion work."  "So  far  from  abnegating  the 
supremacy  of  Christianity,"  says  Dr.  Martin,  of 
the  Imperial  University  of  Peking,  "the  Parlia- 
ment exemplifies  the  attitude  Christianity  must 
assume  to  win  recognition."  And  the  Rev. 
Gilbert  Reid  says:  "While  a  few  from  non- 
Christian  lands  may  misinterpret  the  Parliament, 
the  majority  will  be  drawn  by  the  broad,  sympa- 
thetic attitude  of  Christians,  and  will  continue  to 
be  influenced  by  the  same  spirit."  I  have  received 
one  testimonial  to  the  Parliament  which  I  deem 
of  greater  weight  than  all  the  adverse  criticisms 
which  it  has  been  my  fortune  to  read.*^  The 
Rev.  Daniel  McGilvary,  the  able  and  veteran 
missionary  among  the  Laos,  writes:  "The  Parlia- 
ment of  Religions,  from  its  inception,  com- 
mended itself  to  my  judgment.  Besides  attend- 
ing all  its  sessions,  I  have  read  all  that  I  have 
seen  written  for  and  against  it,  and  that  judg- 
ment remains  unchanged.  Its  records  will  ever 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  note  6. 


3l6    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

remain  a  thesaurus  from  which  missionaries  and 
students  will  draw  on  all  the  subjects  embraced 
in  its  broad  range."  When  we  consider  the 
high  character,  conservative  wisdom,  and  broad 
experience  of  this  missionary,  his  knowledge  of 
the  Buddhist  world  in  which  he  lives,  and  his 
accurate  and  perfect  understanding  of  the  spirit 
which  pervaded  the  Congress,  these  words  are 
entitled  to  the  weight  and  rank  which  I  have 
given  them. 

The  Parliament  speaks  to  Christians  with  a 
brave  and  cheerful  voice,  bidding  us  to  be  full  of 
hope  and  love  and  brotherhood,  bidding  us  to 
emphasize  those  essentials  of  truth  by  which  the 
world  is  to  be  saved,  rather  than  those  non- 
essentials by  which  it  is  liable  to  be  lost.  The 
Parliament  was  not  founded  on  the  false  theory 
that  all  religions  are  equally  good.  It  was 
founded  on  the  spirit  of  Christian  courtesy,  and 
also  on  the  rock  of  absolute  sincerity  in  the 
maintenance  of  individual  convictions.  Nothing 
could  be  further  from  the  facts  than  the  conten- 
tion that  all  the  representatives  of  religion  were 
welcomed  "as  equally  inspired  and  equally 
sufficient  prophets  and  teachers  in  things  sacred 
and  divine."  "Superficial  people,"  writes  Pro- 
fessor Bruce,  of  Scotland,  "might  carry  away 
the  impression  that  it  put  all  religions  on  a  level. 
The  truth,  however,  is  that  it  simply  gave  the 
religions  of  the  world  an  opportunity  of  being 
compared,    one  with    another,  on   their  merits." 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     317 

"That  Christianity,"  says  Dr.  Dennis,  formerly 
a  secretary  of  the  American  Presbyterian  Board 
of  Foreign  Missions,  "has  a  right  to  command, 
is  true;  but  has  it  not  the  right  also  to  dis- 
cuss, compare,  and  persuade?  God  says,  even  to 
offending  sinners,  'Come,  let  us  reason  to- 
gether.' "  "I  do  not  understand,"  he  adds, 
"that  Christianity  ever  resigned  the  purpose  and 
hope  of  both  influencing  and  convincing  men 
through  the  Parliament  of  Religions." 

Much  might  be  rightly  said  of  the  high  char- 
acter and  ability  of  many  of  those  who  composed 
this  assembly.  If  I  were  asked  to-day  to  name 
a  score  and  more  of  those  who  seem  to  me 
now  to  have  been  the  chief  and  most  powerful 
personalities  in  that  Congress,  the  list  would 
include,  besides  several  professors  from  the  Uni- 
versity of  Chicago  and  a  strong  delegation  from 
Japan,  the  Catholic  Archbishop  Keane,  who 
organized  the  Catholic  forces  most  ably,  and 
proved  himself  catholic-hearted  on  every  day  of 
the  Parliament  and  in  every  relation  with  men 
who  differed  from  him  ;  the  Archbishop  of  Zante, 
an  impressive  orator  and  great-hearted  speaker, 
whose  sudden  death,  shortly  after  his  return, 
has  sorrowed  many  hearts ;  Dr.  George  Dana 
Boardman,  of  Philadelphia,  almost  always  pres- 
ent at  the  meetings,  and  a  gracious  influence 
everywhere ;  the  late  Dr.  Philip  Schaff,  the 
eminent  historian,  whose  address  on  the  "  Re- 
union   of    Christendom"   has   been   called   apos- 


31 S    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

tolic;  Mr.  Mozoomdar,  the  leader  of  the  Brah- 
mo-Somaj,  a  man  of  great  eloquence  and  spiritual 
power;  Dr.  Joseph  Cook,  a  critic  of  the  Parlia- 
ment during  many  of  its  days,  and  its  powerful 
champion  since;  Rev.  George  T.  Candlin,  the 
English  missionary  from  China,  who  spoke  so 
persuasively  for  Christian  unity  in  missionary 
fields,  and  who  found  the  Parliament  had  be- 
come an  epoch  in  his  intellectual  life;  the  Hon- 
orable Pung  Quang  Yu,  the  learned  representa- 
tive of  Confucianism,  Mr.  Dharmapala,  the 
gentle  Buddhist  of  Ceylon,  whose  heart  still 
lingers  in  America,  to  which  he  has  returned, 
and  who  writes  most  discouragingly  of  the 
lethargic  spirit  of  the  Buddhist  priests,  and  who 
says  that  "if  Christians  would  include  kindness 
to  animals  in  their  programme,  he  would  be  glad 
to  close  his  life  as  a  preacher  of  Jesus;"  Prince 
Wolkonsky  of  Russia,  whose  voice  was  heard  on 
three  occasions,  always  with  acceptance;  Mr. 
Hirai,  the  Japanese  orator,  whose  stern  denun- 
ciation of  the  sins  of  Christian  people,  evoked 
the  applause  of  Christian  auditors;  the  orator 
of  philosophic  Hinduism  now  welcomed  back  to 
India;  Washington  Gladden,  who  spoke  on  the 
social  problem  with  a  divine  fire  which  ought  to 
burn  down  the  barriers  of  un -Christian  separa- 
tions and  inspire  the  disciples  of  Jesus  to  co- 
operative labors  for  the  common  good  ;  Dr.  Wash- 
burn, of  Constantinople,  who  expounded  the 
Mohammedan    question    with    rare  wisdom,    and 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT   OF  RELIGIONS.     319 

whose  writings  in  behalf  of  the  Parhament  have 
had  a  wide  influence;  Cardinal  Gibbons,  who 
won  may  hearts  when  he  thanked  God  that  there 
is  one  platform  on  which  we  all  stand  united — 
the  platform  of  charity,  of  humanity,  of  benevo- 
lence; Rabbi  Gottheil,  of  New  York,  who  gave 
such  an  eloquent  eulogy  of  Moses,  and  who  con- 
sidered it  the  glory  and  reward  of  his  life  to  be 
able  to  speak  in  such  an  assembly  of  the  man 
who  had  been  light,  strength,  and  inspiration 
to  him  from  childhood ;  Colonel  Thomas  VV. 
Higginson,  who  so  skillfully  turned  the  minds  of 
his  hearers  from  theological  to  less  speculative 
and  more  practical  questions;  Professor  Pea- 
body,  of  Harvard,  who  spoke  of  Christ  as  the 
greatest  Individualist  and  the  greatest  Socialist 
of  history;  Lyman  Abbott,  of  New  York,  who 
eulogized  religion  as  the  essential  foundation  of 
all  religions;  Dr.  Alger,  of  Boston,  who  pointed 
out  with  wonderful  philosophic  insight  the 
necessary  steps  toward  the  spiritual  reunion  of 
mankind;  Dr.  Pentecost,  of  London,  who 
preached  the  Gospel  at  a  Parliament  of  Religions 
with  the  same  aggressive  fearlessness  that  he  em- 
ployed in  addressing  the  college  students  of  Cal- 
cutta; Dr.  Momerie,  the  able  and  brilliant  ex- 
pounder of  Christian  Theism;  Mrs.  Julia  Ward 
Howe,  whose  words  seemed  a  benediction; 
Robert  A.  Hume,  one  of  the  broadest-minded 
and  most  earnest  of  our  Lidian  missionaries; 
Rev.    B.    Fay    Mills,    the    evangelist,    who,  after 


320    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

speaking  of  Christ  as  the  world's  Saviour, 
wrought  his  great  audience  into  a  fervor  of 
Christian  feeling  which  brought  many  of  them 
to  their  feet;  and  Bishop  Dudley,  of  Kentucky, 
who  preached  the  historic  Christ  with  such  ma- 
jestic faith  and  personal  enthusiasm  of  devout 
feeling  that  he  strengthened  the  confidence  of 
multitudes  that  Christ  alone  is  equal  to  the  task 
of  redeeming  humanity. 

No  meeting  like  that  which  I  am  describing, 
however  carefully  planned,  will  be  devoid  of 
mistake.  The  Parliament  of  1893  was  con- 
ducted by  men  who  did  the  best  that  could  be 
done  under  very  difficult  circumstances.  They 
believed  that,  though  some  unfortunate  miscon- 
ceptions would  inevitably  result,  the  undertak- 
ing was  well  worth  the  risk;  and  their  expecta- 
tions have  been  more  than  fulfilled.  Thinking 
of  the  welcome  that  the  Parliament  of  Religions 
has  opened  to  me  in  India — to  me  with  a  dis- 
tinctively Christian  message — I  am  reminded  of 
what  the  Catholic  Professor  of  Comparative  Re- 
hgion  at  Louvain,  Belgium.  Mgr.  D'Harlez,  has 
recently  said  of  the  Parliament,  that  it  was"  a 
good  way  to  promote  the  knowledge  of  truth,  to 
assemble  men  of  all  creeds  under  the  sky  in  a 
princely  assemblage,  so  as  to  conciliate  the  minds 
of  men  who  are  hostile  to  each  other  because  of 
a  thousand  misconceptions  and  prejudices  or 
hereditary,  secular  conflicts,  and  to  make  them 
acknowledge   that   they  are   all   the   children   of 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     321 

one  Celestial  Father  and  Creator.  This  is  the 
best  means  for  the  propagation  of  the  true  re- 
ligion; this  is  a  canal  digged  for  the  flowing  of 
water  from  the  purest  sources.  And  now  the 
missionary  who  enters  into  a  heathen  country  is 
no  more  an  enemy,  not  even  a  stranger,  but  a 
brother  who  comes  to  bring  light  into  the  land 
and  preach  the  common  Father  of  mankind." 
"If,"  he  says,  "subsequent  sessions  of  the  Par- 
liament are  to  be  fruitful,  it  must  be  under  the 
condition  that  they  deviate  not  from  the  original 
aim  and  do  not  serve  the  purpose  of  religious 
indifference." 

Bishop  Vincent  wrote  me  not  long  ago  of  his 
sympathy  with  the  Parliament,  and  said:  "I  hope 
that  similar  gatherings  may  take  place  in  con- 
nection with  the  French  Exposition  of  1900. 
Only  the  systems  which  are  conscious  of  weak- 
ness can  be  afraid  of  an  open  statement  concern- 
ing their  own  views  and  concerning  the  views  of 
those  schools  which  they  regard  as  rival  or  an- 
tagonistic. There  may  be  temporary  embarrass- 
ment occasioned  by  the  full  publication  of  such 
varied  views,  but  thereby  investigation  and  care- 
ful comparison  must  be  promoted.  All  honest 
and  inquiring  souls  will  see  a  large  measure  of 
truth  as  the  result  of  such  investigation."  I 
have  strong  hope  that  a  second  Parliament  will 
take  place  in  Paris.  The  Catholic  hierarchy  of 
America  favors  the  second,  as  it  did  the  first. 
The   Catholic    leaders   of    Europe    are   generally 


32  3    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

hostile  to  the  second  as  they  were  to  the  first ; 
but  there  are  Cathohc  laymen  of  great  influence 
in  France,  who  may  achieve  another  congress  of 
the  creeds. 

The  first  Parliament  has  given  an  impetus  to 
the  study  of  comparative  theology,  which  is  in 
truth  "the  demonstration  of  Christianity."  It 
has  led  to  the  founding  of  two  international 
Lectureships,  one  in  America  and  one  in  India. 
It  has  widened  the  bounds  of  human  fraternity; 
it  is  fortifying  timid  souls  in  regard  to  the  right 
and  wisdom  of  liberty  in  thought  and  expres- 
sion ;  it  is  clarifying  many  minds  in  regard  to 
the  nature  of  the  non-Christian  faiths;  it  is 
deepening,  in  Western  lands,  the  general  Chris- 
tian interest  in  non-Christian  nations ;  and  it  will 
bring  before  millions  in  the  Orient  the  more 
truthful  and  beautiful  aspects  of  Christianity. 

I  think  that  nearly  all  will  agree  with  me  in 
thinking  the  Congress  was  a  notable  event  for 
the  African,  whose  manhood  was  fully  recog- 
nized ;  for  the  Jew,  who  has  suffered  various 
forms  of  persecution ;  for  the  Liberal,  who  saw 
the  truths  for  which  he  had  specially  contended 
grandly  recognized ;  for  the  Roman  Catholic, 
who  came  out  into  a  new  atmosphere  and  gained 
from  theological  opponents  new  admiration  and 
respect;  for  woman,  for  there  she  secured  the 
largest  recognition  of  her  intellectual  rights  ever 
granted.  It  was  a  great  event  for  the  social 
reformer  and  the  advocate  of  international  justice ; 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT   OF  RELIGIONS.     323 

for  the  Parliament  was  unanimous  in  denouncing 
the  selfishness  of  modern  society,  and  the  in- 
iquity of  the  opium  trade  and  the  rum  trafific ; 
for  the  Buddhist,  the  Hindu,  and  the  Confucian, 
who  were  permitted  to  interpret  their  own  faiths 
in  the  Parliament  of  Man;  for  the  orthodox 
Protestant,  whose  heart  and  intellect  were  ex- 
panded, and  whose  faith  in  the  Gospel  of  God's 
grace  was  strengthened  by  the  words  and  scenes 
of  that  assembly ;  and  it  was  especially  a  great 
event  for  the  earnest  and  broad-minded  Christian 
missionary,  who  rejoiced  that  all  Christendom 
was  at  last  forced  to  confront  the  problem  of 
bringing  Christ,  the  Universal  Saviour,  to  all 
mankind. 

It  is  already  evident,  as  Dr.  Ellinwood,  the 
President  of  the  American  Society  of  Compara- 
tive Religion,  has  said,  "that  the  Parliament  has 
come  to  stay."  These  world-wide  comparisons 
must  continue.  Enlightened  men  will  have  the 
best  and  truest,  and  the  best  religion  must  come 
to  the  front.  As  a  Christian  believer,  I  wel- 
come truth  from  every  source.  I  rejoice  that 
our  recent  studies  have  added  much  to  the  spir- 
itual panorama  of  human  history.  The  mild  and 
tolerant  Buddhist  Emperor,  Asoka,  the  Hindu 
Constantine,  takes  his  place  by  the  savage  and 
shrewd  warrior  who  saw  the  Cross  in  the  sky. 
Akbar,  the  Moslem,  appears  unabashed  in  com- 
pany with  Charlemagne  the  Christian.  St. 
Paul's   looms    before    us    on    the    same    horizon 


3^+    CHRISTIANITT,   THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

with  the  Temple  of  Heaven  at  Peking,  and  the 
Milan  Cathedral  stands  by  the  Mosque  of  Omar. 
The  waters  from  the  Well  of  Zemzem  together 
with  those  from  Bethesda  are  brought  to  our 
lips.  The  strange  pictures  of  the  Orient  startle 
the  eyes  which  have  seen  the  canvases  of  Fra 
Angelico  and  Titian.  Moses  and  Mohammed 
walk  before  our  vision ;  saints  throng  round  us, 
besides  those  in  the  Acta  Sanctorum  of  Catholic 
Europe;  the  monks  of  the  Nile  and  the  monks 
of  Thibet  look  out  upon  us,  while  the  sacred 
books  of  the  Orient,  an  imposing  library  in  them- 
selves, dwarf  the  modest  volumes  of  the  Old  and 
New  Testaments.  But  we  who  have  accepted 
the  Christian  Gospel  as  the  world's  hope  and 
salvation  need  not  be  disturbed  nor  distracted; 

For  over  all  the  creeds  the  face  of  Christ 
Glows  with  white  glory  on  the  face  of  Man. 

We  have  seen  Him,  who,  in  various  measure, 
has  enlightened  all.  He  is  the  key  to  history 
and  to  religion,  because  He  is  the  Reconciler  as 
well  as  the  Redeemer,  and  only  His  Spirit,  pene- 
trating into  all  the  earth,  could  have  called  forth 
such  expressions  of  fraternity  among  men  of 
wide-sundered  faiths,  as  rejoiced  our  hearts  in 
the  World's  First  Parliament  of  Religions. 

It  has  been  wisely  said  that  "the  graves  of  the 
dead  religions  declare  that  not  selection,  but  in- 
corporation, makes  a  religion  strong;  not  incor- 
poration, but  reconciliation ;  not  reconciliation 
but  the  fulfillment  of  all  these  aspirations,  these 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     325 

partial  truths  in  a  higher  thought,  in  a  transcend- 
ent life."  The  ethnic  faiths  are  not  mere  curi- 
osities or  moral  monstrosities  on  the  one  hand, 
and  still  less,  on  the  other,  are  they  the  final 
faiths  of  the  nations  adopting  them — Chris- 
tianity, tolerant,  because  cherishing  an  invincible 
faith  in  her  spiritual  victory,  not  "divorced  from 
the  moral  order  of  history,"  but  penetrating, 
explaining,  and  crowning  that  order,  Chris- 
tianity, all  luminous  with  Christ,  is  the  religion 
of  the  coming  man ;  for  Christ  is  the  eternal  Son 
of  God,  in  whom  Reason  and  Faith,  the  Indi- 
vidual and  Society,  Man  and  Woman,  Morality 
and  Religion,  Heaven  and  Earth,  are  perfectly 
conjoined  and  reconciled.  He  is,  and  may  be 
shown  to  be,  the  New  Dispensation,  which  the 
saintly  Chunder  Sen  of  India  believed  had  dawned 
in  his  own  heart ;  He  is  the  harmony  of  all 
Scriptures,  Saints,  and  Sects,  of  Inspiration  and 
of  Science,  of  Asiatic  thought  and  of  Western 
activity,  the  reconciliation  of  apparent  contra- 
dictions, "the  invisible  Westminster  Abbey" 
where  the  enmities  of  more  than  a  hundred  gen- 
erations are  to  lie  buried  and  forgotten. 

He  came  among  men,  not  to  make  them  re- 
ligious, but  to  make  them  holy.  The  man  is 
religious  who  offers  rice  to  the  hideous  idols  of 
an  Asiatic  temple,  or  beats  a  horrible  drum  to 
keep  away  the  witches  from  an  African  village, 
but  the  pagan,  whether  living  here  or  in  Canton 
or   Natal,  needs  a   new   heart.      Loving   sin,   he 


326    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

must  learn  to  love  holiness.^  The  world  needs 
the  Christian  religion.  India  needs  Christ.  I 
speak  with  some  confidence  on  this  point.  In 
the  providence  of  God,  I  have  given  time,  dur- 
ing the  best  years  of  my  life,  to  the  examination 
of  this  question,  and  I  have  had  opportunities 
such  as  few  other  men  ever  had  of  seeing 
and  knowing  the  best  side  of  the  ethnic  religions. 
I  count  as  my  friends  Parsees  and  Hindus,  Bud- 
dhists and  Confucianists,  Shintoists,  Jains,  and 
Mohammedans.  I  know  what  they  say  about 
themselves.  I  have  looked  at  their  religions  on 
the  ideal  side,  as  well  as  the  practical,  and  I 
know  this,  that  the  very  best  which  is  in  them, 
the  very  best  which  these  well-meaning  men 
have  shown  to  us,  is  often  a  reflex  from  Chris- 
tianity, and  that  which  they  lack,  and  the  lack  is 
very  serious,  is  what  the  Christian  Gospel  alone 
can  impart ;  and  I  know  that  beneath  the  shin- 
ing examples  of  the  elect  few  in  the  non-Chris- 
tian world  there  is  a  vast  area  of  idolatry,  and 
pollution,  and  unrest,  and  superstition,  and 
cruelty,  which  can  never  be  healed  by  the  forces 
which  are  found  in  the  non-Christian  systems. 
Recognizing  to  the  full  the  brighter  side  of  so- 
called  heathenism,  rejoicing  that  the  light  has 
been  shining  everywhere,  and  that  foreshadow- 
ings  of  the  evangelic  truths  are  discoverable 
among  the  nations,  I  yet  see  that  in  Christ  only 
is  there  full  salvation  for  the  individual  and  for 
''  Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  Note  7. 


WORLD'S  PARLIAMENT  OF  RELIGIONS.     327 

society.  Many  wise  and  true  opinions  are 
doubtless  held  by  the  disciples  of  the  ethnic 
faiths,  but  opinions,  however  true,  are  not 
man's  crying  need.  Jesus  Christ  is  not  only  the 
Truth,  but  He  is  also  the  Way  and  the  Life.* 
Men  need  to  know  the  way  which  is  the  way  of 
the  Cross;  they  need  to  feel  the  touch  of  the 
life  from  Him  who  came  that  men  might  have 
life.  I  believe  that  He  has  been  everywhere  by 
His  Spirit,  and  that  all  that  is  true,  beautiful 
and  good  is  a  part  of  His  manifested  glory.  But 
the  work  of  His  Church,  made  one  in  Him,  is  to 
reveal  to  mankind  the  Christ  of  the  Gospels  and 
the  Christ  of  personal  experience,  to  be  wit- 
nesses of  His  truth  and  love  to  the  uttermost 
parts  of  the  earth.  He  came  to  earth  to  lift  us 
to  heaven.  He  was  delivered  unto  death  for  the 
offences  of  men;  He  was  raised  from  the  grave 
for  the  justification  of  our  faith  in  Him;  and, 
thus  exalted.  He  has  promised  to  draw  all  men 
unto  Him.  And  we  have  a  moral  and  intellec- 
tual right,  with  all  brotherly  kindness  in  our 
souls,  to  ask  kings  and  sages,  poets,  and  proph- 
ets, and  all  peoples  to  crown  Him  the  Lord  of 
all.  In  the  olden  days  when  the  German  em- 
peror was  chosen,  the  three  archbishops  of 
Treves,  Mayence,  and  Cologne  girt  him  with 
the  sword  and  crowned  him  with  the  crown  of 
Charlemagne.  At  the  banquet  the  Bohemian 
king  was  his  cup-bearer;  the  Count  Palatine 
*  Appendix,  Lecture  VII,  Note  8. 


328    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

plunged  his  knife  into  the  roasted  ox  and  waited 
on  his  Master;  the  Duke  of  Saxony  spurred  his 
horse  into  heaps  of  golden  grain  and  bore  off  a 
full  measure  for  his  lord,  while  the  Margrave  of 
Brandenburg  rode  to  a  fountain  and  filled  the  im- 
perial ewer  with  water.  Standing  this  day,  as 
in  the  presence  of  the  chief  prophets  and  might- 
iest forces  of  the  world,  let  us  expect  a  new 
coronation  of  the  world's  living  Christ,  the 
rightful  Emperor  of  mankind.  Let  the  Churches, 
girt  with  his  sword  of  spiritual  power,  crown  Him 
with  the  royal  diadem  which  is  His  due.  Let 
princes  and  nobles  be  the  servants  of  His  Gos- 
pel; let  kings  and  emperors  wait  on  Him  who  is 
the  Ancient  of  Days ;  let  cities  bring  great  meas- 
ures of  gold  to  publish  His  word;  and  let  univer- 
sities, loyal  to  the  spirit  which  has  founded  the 
chief  seats  of  the  higher  Western  and  Eastern 
learning,  forsaking  every  unworthy  and  strange 
idolatry  of  human  leaders,  fill  their  imperial 
chalices  from  the  river  of  the  Water  of  Life,  and 
stand  attendant  on  their  Lord. 


APPENDIX. 


APPENDIX. 

DR.    BARROWS    IN    INDIA    AND    JAPAN.* 

BY    REV.   ROBERT    A.   HUME,   D.D. 

Every  one  knows  that  time  is  needed  for  the  de- 
velopment of  great  things  in  vegetation,  in  animal 
life,  and  in  architecture.  But  every  one  does  not 
understand  that  there  is  similar  need  of  time  for 
the  development  and  for  an  adequate  appreciation 
of  great  things  in  mind  and  in  spirit.  The  Parlia- 
ment of  Religions,  which  met  in  Chicago  in  1893, 
was  a  unique  and  great  event  in  the  world  of  mind 
and  spirit.  Therefore,  according  to  the  law  of  life, 
time  is  necessary  for  the  development  of  its  results 
and  for  men  to  fully  appreciate  it.  Hence,  though 
held  in  America,  it  is  not  yet  adequately  under- 
stood even  there.  Much  less  can  its  true  signifi- 
cance be  grasped  in  distant  Asia  from  the  reports 
of  comparatively  few  persons.  But  it  is  the  nature 
of  great  things  that  they  must  diffuse  themselves 
and  their  fruits.  It  is  an  evidence  that  the  First 
Parliament  of  Religions  was  great  that  it  is  yearly 
more  and  more  diffusing  itself.  It  was  conceived 
and  grew  in  connection  with  the  greatest  Inter- 
national Exposition  of  material  things,  because  its 

*This  narrative  of  Dr.  Barrows's  reception  in  the  Orient,  and  this  account  of 
the  circumstances  under  which  his  addresses  were  given,  will  add,  doubtless, 
further  interest  to  the  Lectures  themselves. —  The  Publishers. 


332    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION, 

promoters  believed  that  a  colossal  exhibition  of 
such  things  is  inadequate,  and  in  some  respects 
dangerous,  unless  there  is  with  it  and  in  it  an  ex- 
position of  the  greatest  spiritual  things.  This  con- 
viction brought  forth  the  Parliament,  the  first  truly 
ecumenical  exposition  of  religions. 

And,  of  course,  if  it  was  to  be  an  ecumenical 
exposition  of  spiritual  things,  it  could  not  be  con- 
ducted on  a  less  courteous  or  less  wide  basis  than 
the  exposition  of  material  things.  In  this  latter 
exposition  every  nation,  even  the  weakest  and 
least  advanced,  was  invited  to  send  specimens  of 
its  best  products,  to  be  selected  and  displayed  by 
its  own  representatives  in  their  own  way,  and  to  be 
placed  by  the  side  of  the  products  of  other  lands, 
in  the  confidence  that  such  an  exposition  would  be 
mutually  helpful.  The  products  displayed  by  the 
United  States,  Great  Britain,  and  Germany  were 
immensely  superior  to  the  displays  sent  from  Af- 
rica and  South  America.  Nevertheless  the  mutual 
exposition  was  helpful  to  Europe  and  America,  as 
well  as  to  Africa  and  South  America. 

It  ought  to  have  been  in  a  similarly  courteous 
spirit,  and  it  was  in  such  a  spirit,  that  the  interna- 
tional exhibition  of  religions  was  conceived  and 
conducted.  Its  meaning  was  the  supremacy  of  the 
spiritual  element  in  man.  This  was  noble  in  itself, 
and  more  sublime  because  of  its  connection  with  a 
gigantic  exhibition  of  the  material  products  of  the 
world.  Representatives  of  each  religion  presented 
their  faiths  in  their  own  way.  All  were  not  fair  or 
wise.  But  no  other  course  would  have  been  feas- 
ible or  wise.     Naturally  the  followers  of  each  relig- 


APPENDIX.  333 

ion  put  a  very  high  estimate  on  their  own  faith. 
But  it  does  not  seem  doubtful  that  the  one  crown- 
ing impression  of  the  Parliament  was,  in  the  su- 
premacy of  spiritual  things,  the  supremacy  of 
Christ.  None  but  Christians  could  or  would  have 
planned  or  executed  it. 

Because  it  was  a  living  spiritual  power,  the  Par- 
liament of  Religions  led  to  subsequent  important 
events.  First,  a  Christian  lady  of  America,  Mrs. 
Caroline  E.  Haskell,  founded  a  lectureship  on  Com- 
parative Religion  in  the  Chicago  University,  for 
attendants  at  that  institution.  Then,  she  founded 
a  lectureship  on  the  same  subject  in  connection 
with  the  same  University,  but  the  lectures  to  be  de- 
livered in  India,  every  other  year,  by  some  eminent 
man.  Naturally  Mrs.  Haskell  and  the  University 
requested  the  president  of  the  Parliament,  the  Rev. 
John  Henry  Barrows,  D.D.,  to  be  the  first  lecturer 
to  India  on  this  foundation.  But  he  declined  the 
appointment.  Just  before  that  time  Mr.  Gladstone 
had  retired  from  political  life,  and  he  was  then  for- 
mally requested  by  the  University  to  come  to 
India  to  give  the  first  series  of  lectures  on  the  rela- 
tion of  Christianity  to  the  faiths  of  this  land.  He 
also  declined,  and  suggested  Canon  Gore.  That 
eminent  man  was  unable  to  accept  the  invitation. 
The  University  then  again  most  urgently  requested 
Dr.  Barrows  to  accept  the  appointment.  He  was 
the  pastor  of  the  First  Presbyterian  Church  of  Chi- 
cago, and  laid  the  matter  before  the  authorities  of 
the  church.  They  felt  that  it  was  undesirable  to 
give  him  the  prolonged  leave  of  absence  necessary 
for  this  purpose.     But  under  all  the  circumstances 


334    CHRISTIANIT2',   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

it  seemed  to  him  that  there  was  a  divine  call  to 
this  service.  Therefore,  he  resigned  his  important 
position  in  Chicago  and  went  to  Germany  to  secure 
the  amplest  preparation  for  the  first  series  of  lec- 
tures on  this  new  foundation. 

Two  influential  communities  in  India  looked  for- 
ward with  deep  interest  and  questioning  to  these 
Barrows-Haskell  lectures — viz.,  the  non-Christian 
religious  reformers,  and  the  Christian  missionaries. 
The  former  have  been  much  influenced  by  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ;  they  know  that  there  has  been  some 
change  among  Western  Christians  in  conceiving 
and  stating  the  Christian  faith,  and  they  have 
thought  and  hoped  that  the  Parliament  of  Relig- 
ions meant  and  would  more  and  more  show  that 
none  of  the  present  religions  of  the  world  is  to  be- 
come the  final  religion,  but  that  each,  with  some 
modifications,  is  good  enough  for  its  adherents, 
and  that  the  final,  universal  religion  will  be  some 
mixture  and  outcome  of  them  all.  Such  persons 
anticipated,  with  much  hope,  yet  with  some  mis- 
giving, the  coming  of  Dr.  Barrows. 

Because  the  entire  non-Christian  community  in 
India  had  so  interpreted  the  Parliament  of  Relig- 
ions, and  because  most  missionaries  in  India  have 
not  had  time  to  see  what  is  to  be  the  real  outcome 
of  that  unique  religious  conference,  many  mission- 
aries here  looked  forward  with  misgiving  lest  the 
Barrows-Haskell  lectures  would  lead  Indians  to 
think  that  leaders  of  the  West  had  somewhat  low- 
ered the  Christian  standard.  But  there  were  some 
missionaries  who  confidently  expected  a  high  and 
strong  presentation  of  their  faith. 


APPENDIX.  335 

The  great  courtesy  and  kindness  which  Dr.  Bar- 
rows had  shown  to  the  Indian  representatives  of  all 
faiths  at  the  Chicago  Conference,  and  his  unique 
position,  both  as  the  president  of  that  remarkable 
gathering,  and  now  as  representative  of  the  vigor- 
ous young  University  of  Chicago  to  the  thinking 
men  of  India,  made  it  certain  that  he  would  have  a 
most  cordial  reception  from  all  classes  in  this  cour- 
teous country,  whatever  he  might  say.  When  he 
landed  in  Bombay,  accompanied  by  Mrs.  Barrows, 
on  December  15,  1896,  he  was  very  heartily  wel- 
comed by  representatives  of  the  Hindu,  Jain, 
Parsi,  Brahmo  and  Christian  communities,  partly 
through  delegations  and  partly  by  letters.  The 
Bombay  Missionary  Conference  had  arranged  a 
large  reception  for  him  at  Wilson  College,  where 
leaders  of  all  communities  were  to  meet  him.  But 
on  account  of  the  epidemic  which  is  ravaging  Bom- 
bay it  was  deemed  best  that  he  should  hurry  away 
from  that  city,  and  the  reception  was  given  up. 
He  went  first  to  Benares  and  spent  five  days  in  ob- 
servations of  Hinduism  in  its  capital,  and  in  making 
several  addresses.  But  his  work  began  in  Calcutta, 
the  political  and  intellectual  capital  of  India,  where 
he  stayed  from  December  23d  to  January  4th. 

A  noble  reception,  worthy  of  the  hospitality  of 
hospitable  India  and  most  honorable  to  the  leader 
of  Hindu  society  in  Calcutta,  was  given  at  the 
palace  of  Maharajah  Bahadur  Sir  Jotindra  Mohun 
Tagore,  K.C.  S.I.,  by  representatives  of  the  Hindu, 
Mohammedan,  Jain,  Parsi,  Buddhist,  Brahmo,  and 
Christian  communities.  It  was  a  unique  and  grand 
occasion,  the    exact    parallel  to    which  has  never 


336    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

occurred,  when,  in  an  orthodox  Hindu  prince's  pal- 
ace, representatives  of  every  faith  met  to  give  the 
heartiest  welcome  to  a  Christian  lecturer  from  the 
West.  At  this  introduction  to  his  special  mission 
to  India,  among  other  fraternal  messages  Dr.  Bar- 
rows said,  after  words  of  welcome  had  been  spoken 
by  Rev.  Dr.  K.  S.   Macdonald : 

It  is  one  of  the  chief  privileges  of  my  life  to  stand  at  last 
on  the  soil  of  India  and  to  look  with  wondering  eyes  on 
scenes  of  strangeness  and  of  splendor  which  have  long  been 
present  to  the  eyes  of  the  mind,  to  bring  to  the  ancient 
and  thoughtful  Orient  loving  salutations  from  the  young 
and  vigorous  Occident,  and  to  speak,  however  imperfectly, 
some  words  of  brotherly  affection  which  may  help  to  bring 
them  into  a  closer  union  of  spirit.  ...  I  have  come  to 
India,  not  merely  to  inaugurate  a  Christian  lectureship, 
bringing  America  into  telegraphic  spiritual  communication 
with  Calcutta,  but  also  to  make  further  studies  into  the  life 
of  this  ancient  and  wondrous  land ;  I  have  come  in  order  to 
realize  still  further  the  spiritual  indebtedness  of  the  world 
to  Asia;  to  clasp  hands  with  those  of  kindred  purposes  and 
of  various  creeds,  who,  believing  in  the  Fatherhood  of  God 
and  the  Brotherhood  of  Man,  realize,  as  Cardinal  Gibbons 
said  to  us  on  the  opening  day  of  the  Parliament,  that  we 
never  perform  an  act  so  pleasing  to  God  as  when  we  extend 
the  right  hand  of  fellowship  and  of  practical  love  to  a  suf- 
fering member  of  His  earthly  family.  ...  I  desire  to 
be  numbered  among  those  who  are  lovers  of  India. 
Religion  has  achieved  a  great  work  in  the  past — a  work 
marred,  however,  by  serious  imperfections.  Its  best  min- 
istry lies,  not  in  the  years  behind  us  with  their  alienations, 
their  bitterness  and  cruel  persecutions,  but  belongs  rather  to 
that  splendid  future  when  the  worshipers  of  God  and  the 
lovers  of  men  shall  fully  realize  that  religion  in  its  truest 
manifestations  is  able  to  bind  the  world  together  into  a  cos- 
mopolitan fraternity.  .  .  .  May  that  spirit  which  the 
Christians  believe  is  the  spirit  of  Jesus  prevail  still  more 
widely  and  pervade  still  more  deeply. 


APPENDIX.  337 

The  six  lectures  on  the  Haskell  foundation  were 
delivered  in  the  Hall  of  the  General  Assembly's 
Institution,  in  the  northern  part  of  Calcutta,  and 
half  of  them  were  also  given  in  the  London  Mis- 
sion's Institution  in  the  southern  quarter  of  the  cit)^ 
In  addition,  lectures,  sermons,  and  addresses,  on 
such  topics  as  "The  Spiritual  World  of  Shakes- 
peare," "The  Parliament  of  Religions,"  "Human 
Restlessness  and  Christ  its  Quieter,  "  "The  Comfort 
of  Christian  Theism"  were  delivered  before  asso- 
ciations of  students  and  other  bodies.  Almost 
every  morning  there  were  personal  interviews  with 
representatives  of  various  religions.  Very  cordial 
receptions  were  given  to  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Barrows  by 
the  widow  of  Keshub  Chunder  Sen  and  her 
daughter,  the  Maharani  of  Kuch  Behar,  on  the 
anniversary  of  Mr.  Sen's  last  public  service;  by 
Mr.  Mozoomdar,  the  present  leader  of  the  New 
Dispensation,  and  by  others. 

On  the  8th  of  February,  the  Calcutta  Missionary 
Conference  recorded  the  following  deliverance: 

The  Conference  desire  to  put  on  record  their  sense  of  the 
very  great  service  Dr.  Barrows  has  rendered  to  the  cause 
of  Christianity  in  India  by  the  six  lectures  on  Mrs.  Haskell's 
Foundation  which  he  delivered  in  Calcutta  on  the  Univer- 
sality of  the  Christian  Religion.  They  were  distinguished 
by  their  high-toned  earnestness,  their  incisive  force,  their 
brave  and  unambiguous  outspokenness,  their  thorough 
grasp  of  the  great  truths  they  handled,  their  practical  value 
as  a  contribution  to  Christian  apologetics,  their  profound 
learning  and  sweet  persuasiveness.  In  them,  the  inaugu- 
rating series  of  the  lectureship,  were  fulfilled  the  prom- 
ises made  at  its  inception.  They  were  distinguished  by  the 
scholarly  and  withal  friendly,  temperate  and  conciliatory 
manner  in  which  opponents  of  Christianity  were  referred  to, 


338    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

and  by  the  fraternal  spirit  which  animated  all  allusions  to 
the  devotees  of  other  religions.  While  the  rightful  claims 
of  Christianity  were  set  forth  without  compromise  or  hesi- 
tation, they  were  at  the  same  time  set  forth  in  such  a  way 
as  to  secure  the  favorable  interest  of  the  many  who  would 
not  acknowledge  these  claims.  The  Conference  were  also 
struck  by  the  untiring  activity  which  Dr  Barrows  mani- 
fested during  his  short  stay  of  fourteen  days  in  Calcutta, 
for  during  that  period  he  addressed  as  many  as  twenty-two 
audiences  in  the  same  earnest  forceful  manner,  never  spar- 
ing himself,  or  in  any  way  compromising  his  position  as  a 
Christian  lecturer,  desirous  of  winning  souls  for  the  Lord 
Jesus.  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Barrows  carry  with  them  wherever 
they  go  the  best  wishes  and  the  prayers  of  the  members  of 
the  Calcutta  Missionary  Conference. 

The  Conference  desire  to  place  also  on  record  their 
hope  that  the  six  "Barrows  Lectures"  be  printed  in  a  cheap 
form  and  widely  circulated  in  single  lectures  and  also  as  a 
book  containing  all  six;  and  that  those  which  are  to  follow 
on  the  Foundation  may  be  of  the  same  type  and  equally 
useful  to  the  missionary  cause. 

In  expressing  their  high  appreciation  of  Dr.  Barrows  as 
a  Christian  lecturer,  the  Conference  would  not  forget  their 
obligations  to  the  good  Christian  lady,  Mrs.  Caroline  E. 
Haskell,  who  so  liberally  founded  the  Barrows  Lectures, 
and  to  the  members  of  the  University  of  Chicago  who 
secured  Dr.  John  Henry  Barrows  to  inaugurate  the  Lec- 
tureship. The  Conference  send  their  greetings  to  Mrs. 
Haskell,  and  wish  her  a  long,  useful  and  happy  life  in  the 
Lord's  service  on  earth,  and  that  thus  be  richly  supplied 
unto  her  the  entrance  into  the  eternal  Kingdom  of  our 
Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ. 

In  a  farewell  address  Mr.  Mozoomdar  said: 

Whatever  the  occasion  be,  we  thank  him  for  com- 
ing here,  and  with  the  deepest  gratitude  thank  that  benefi- 
cent and  bountiful  lady,  Mrs.  Haskell,  whose  endowed 
lectureship  has  brought  Dr.  Barrows  to  India.  .  .  .  The 
finished  product  of  American  culture,  what  he  places 
before  us,  as  on  an  altar,  is  full  of  the  sweetness  and  light, 


APPENDIX.  339 

the  reasonableness,  the  tireless  energy,  and  above  all  the 
brotherly  kindliness  and  human  love  which  we  get  from  so 
few  foreigners,  but,  getting,  we  know  how  to  appreciate. 
Yes,  his  words  and  example  will  lead  us  in  one  of  the  many 
paths  which  wind  on  to  that  high  and  distant  goal  whereto 
new  India,  revived  India,  spiritual  India  is  striving  to 
make  its  pilgrimage. 

In  addition  to  the  value  of  Dr.  Barrows's  own  ser- 
vices, it  has  been  a  distinct  advantage  to  the  pur- 
pose of  his  visit  that  Mrs.  Barrows  accompanied  him. 
After  two  weelcs  of  constant  speaking  in  Calcutta, 
a  few  days  of  rest  were  enjoyed  at  Darjeeling,  in 
sight  of  the  Himalayas.  After  this  Dr.  Barrows 
visited  Lucknow,  where  two  lectures  were  deliv- 
ered; Cawnpore;  Delhi,  where  he  spoke  four  times; 
Lahore,  where  five  addresses  were  given;  Amrit- 
sar;  Agra,  where  he  delivered  five  addresses;  Jey- 
pore,  Ajmere,  Indore,  Ahmednagar;  Poona,  where 
he  gave  ten  lectures  and  addresses;  Bangalore,  Vel- 
lore,  and  Madras. 

In  Delhi  his  addresses  were  delivered  in  St. 
Stephen's  College,  of  the  Cambridge  Mission.  In 
Lahore  his  first  lecture  was  presided  over  by  Dr.  J. 
Sime,  the  Director  of  Public  Instruction  in  the 
Panjab;  the  second  was  presided  over  by  the 
Bishop  of  Lahore;  and  the  third  by  Colonel  Robin- 
son, the  British  Commissioner.  In  Agra  he  gave 
his  addresses  at  St.  John's  College  of  the  Church 
Missionary  Society  and  at  the  Government  Agra 
College.  At  Indore  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Barrows  were 
the  recipients  of  very  kind  attentions  from  the 
Maharajah  Holkar,  and  from  the  members  of  the 
Brahmo  Samaj.  At  Ahmednagar  their  time  was 
largely  spent  in  studying  Missions.     In  Poona  he 


340    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

had  a  great  reception  from  the  leading  gentlemen 
of  the  non-Christian  communities  at  the  General 
Library.  At  the  close  of  his  final  lecture  in  Poona, 
Dr.  Mackichan,  President  of  Wilson  College,  Bom- 
bay, earnestly  commended  the  lectures  to  the  can- 
did attention  of  thoughtful  Hindus  as  being  of  ex- 
ceptional worth. 

In  a  very  cordial  editorial  account  in  the  Banga- 
lore Daily  Post  of  Dr.  Barrows's  visit  to  Banga- 
lore, is  the  following: 

As  was  observed  by  Mr.  Slater  in  the  hall  last  evening, 
three  such  Christian  lectures,  so  comprehensive  and  eru- 
dite, so  eloquent  and  ornate,  so  earnest  and  persuasive, 
generous  and  sympathetic,  have  probably  never  before 
been  delivered  in  Bangalore.  They  were  altogether  unique 
of  their  kind.  It  requires  a  cultivated  and  historical  fac- 
ulty, a  keen  literary  taste  and  fair  acquaintance  with  his- 
torical Christianity  to  intelligently  follow  and  really 
appreciate  Dr.  Barrows  in  his  wide,  deep,  and  masterly 
treatment  of  his  many-sided  subject.  Seldom  have  edu- 
cated Hindus  listened  to  such  a  sublime,  powerful,  and  bold 
exposition  of  the  truths  and  claims  of  the  religion  of  Christ. 

In  Bangalore  Dr.  Barrows  was  the  recipient  of 
graceful  courtesies  from  the  Cosmopolitan  Club, 
composed  of  Hindu  gentlemen  of  various  creeds. 
At  his  lecture  in  Vellore,  the  Mohammedan  mayor 
of  the  city  presided.  A  great  public  demonstra- 
tion was  given  in  the  Victoria  Town  Hall,  Madras, 
on  February  15th.  The  address  of  welcome  was 
signed  by  a  large  committee  representing  many 
faiths,  but  all  united  in  the  spirit  of  friendliest 
courtesy  and  appreciation  toward  the  president  of 
the  Parliament  of  Religions.  His  opening  lecture 
on  February  i6th,  crowded  the  Victoria  Town  Hall 


APPENDIX.  341 

to  its  utmost  capacity,  and  the  audiences  remained 
very  large  to  the  close.  His  visit  to  Madras  was 
in  some  respects  the  climax  of  his  work  in  India. 
Great  interest  had  been  awakened  by  the  recent  re- 
turn and  addresses  of  Swami  Vivekananda,  so  that 
religious  discussion  prevailed  in  the  bazaar,  the 
colleges,  the  homes,  and  the  journals.  A  large  re- 
ception was  given  Dr.  Barrows  while  in  Madras,  by 
the  Triplicane  Literary  Club,  and  other  receptions 
by  the  India  Social  Reformers  and  the  native 
Christians. 

From  Madras  Dr.  Barrows  visited  Salem  and 
Coimbatore.  After  this  he  went  to  Trichur,  on  the 
Malabar  coast,  where  he  was  the  guest  of  the 
Prince  and  Patriarch  Nouri,  of  the  Syrian  Church. 
This  ancient  church,  through  its  highest  officials 
and  its  large  membership,  gave  Dr.  Barrows  a  most 
cordial  and  brilliant  welcome. 

His  course  then  led  him  to  Madura,  where  a  cor- 
dial greeting  awaited  him  from  Christians  and  non- 
Christians.  Besides  several  lectures  in  Madura, 
he  addressed  the  Christian  College  in  the  neigh- 
boring village  of  Pasumalai.  The  impression  made 
by  his  work  here  is  shown  in  what  Rev.  J.  P. 
Jones,  D.D.,  of  Pasumalai,  wrote  to  The  Indepen- 
dent^   of    New   York : 

The  recent  visit  of  Dr.  Barrows  and  his  eloquent,  power- 
ful lectures  have  brought  cheer  and  courage  to  every  mis- 
sionary in  India,  and  have  done  not  a  little  to  give  a  right 
view  of  our  faith  to  many  who  have  recently  been  carried 
away  by  Vedantic  platitudes  and  fallacies.  America  is  to 
be  congratulated  upon  establishing  the  first  lectureship  of 
this  kind,  and  at  a  time  when  it  is  so  much  needed.  And 
Dr.  Barrows  is  to  be  congratulated   upon   the  conspicuous 


342    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

success  with  which  he  has   opened   this   lectureship   that  is 
honored  by  his  name. 

Dr.  Barrows's  closing  work  in  India  was  a  series 
of  lectures  and  addresses  in  Palamacotta  and  Tin- 
nevelly,  where  the  native  Christians  built  a  special 
pandal  or  tabernacle. 

On  the  1 2th  and  13th  of  March  he  lectured  to 
large  audiences,  many  of  them  Buddhists,  in  Wesley 
College,  Colombo.  Arriving  in  Japan  on  the  5th  of 
April,  Dr.  Barrows  discovered  that  there  was  an 
eager  desire  for  the  delivery  of  his  lectures  in  the 
Island  Empire.  His  nineteen  days  in  Japan  were 
fully  occupied  with  work  similar  to  that  which  he 
carried  on  in  India.  One  lecture  was  delivered  in 
Kobe,  on  the  Inland  Sea,  four  addresses  in  Osaka, 
seven  in  Kioto,  three  in  Yokohama,  and  seven  in 
Tokio.  Receptions  were  given  him  by  the  mission- 
aries in  Osaka,  Kioto,  Yokohama,  and  Tokio.  In 
the  beautiful  Botanical  Garden  in  the  Japanese  cap- 
ital a  reception  was  extended  Dr.  Barrows  by  rep- 
resentatives of  the  Christian,  Buddhist,  Shintoist, 
and  Confucianist  religions.  The  welcome  accorded 
in  Japan  was  similar  to  that  in  India.  Resolutions 
were  offered  by  the  Missionary  Conference  in  Sen- 
dai  heartily  approving  Dr.  Barrows's  work  and  ex- 
pressing the  hope  that  a  Japanese  Lectureship 
might  be  established  similar  in  spirit  and  purpose 
to  the  India  Lectureship.  On  May  3d,  Dr.  Bar- 
rows lectured  on  Christ,  the  Universal  Man  and 
Saviour,  in  the  Union  Church,  Honolulu.  On  May 
loth  he  reached  San  Francisco. 

Before  Dr.  Barrows  left  India  the  call  became  so 


APPENDIX.  343 

loud  and  general  for  the  immediate  production  of 
an  inexpensive  edition  of  the  lectures  that  he  gave 
them  to  the  Christian  Literature  Society  of  India, 
of  which  Dr.  Murdoch  is  secretary,  and  five  thou- 
sand copies  were  published,  and  these  have  been 
largely  taken  and  are  doing  good  work  in  this 
country. 

The  standpoint  of  the  lectures  is  clearly  indi- 
cated by  theirgeneral  title  :  "Christianity,the  World- 
Religion.  "  This  thesis  has  been  developed  and 
maintained  in  a  large  and  kindly  way,  by  a  mas- 
terly massing  of  facts,  by  forcible  argument,  and 
by  a  most  sympathetic  spirit  toward  all  that  is  good 
in  every  faith.  Some  of  those  who  were  not  pres- 
ent at  the  Parliament  of  Religions  have  been  sur- 
prised at  the  strong,  unhesitating  utterances  of  Dr. 
Barrows  in  regard  to  the  Christian  faith  as  sure  to 
become  the  Universal  Religion.  But  the  series  has 
been  everywhere  received  with  marked  interest  and 
attention.  The  following  are  examples  of  what 
has  been  said  in  various  organs  of  different  relig- 
ious communities: 

Unity  and  the  Minister.,  the  organ  of  the  Church 
of  the  New  Dispensation,  said: 

Dr.  Barrovvs's  presence  here  was  imposing  and  enchant- 
ing, and  gave  an  impetus  to  the  mind  of  the  thoughtful 
portion  of  his  Christian  and  non-Christian  hearers. 
We  knew  he  was  a  Christian  of  the  orthodox  school,  and 
his  recent  lectures  have  not  disappointed  us,  but  increased 
our  admiration  for  him.  Our  admiration  for  Dr.  Barrows 
was  the  greater,  because,  being  a  Christian  of  what  may 
be  called  the  orthodox  school,  his  heart  was  so  liberal,  so 
world-embracing,  so  many-sided. 


344    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

The  Itidian  Christian  Herald,  the  organ  of  the 
Bengali  Christians,  said: 

The  incidents  of  the  visit  of  Dr.  Barrows  to  Calcutta 
have  brought  into  demonstrative  relief,  the  mighty  hold, 
more  or  less  distinctly  realized,  of  Christianity  on  the 
national  conscience.  The  mission  of  Dr.  Barrows,  it  was 
well  understood,  was  solely  and  wholly  to  commend  to  the 
people  the  fitness  of  Christianity  to  become  the  world- 
religion.  Never  before  had  a  Hindu  Maharaja's  palace 
been  thrown  open  to  celebrate  the  welcome  of  one  with  so 
exclusive  a  message  to  deliver.  Never  before  had  Hindus, 
Mohammedans,  Parsis,  Buddhists,  Jains,  and  Brahmosvied 
with  Christians  in  wishing  godspeed  to  so  single-purposed 
a  herald.  Nor  was  the  spell  broken  with  the  development 
of  the  mission.  The  prayer  which,  for  the  first  time, 
went  up  from  the  palatial  hall,  "May  the  spirit  of  Jesus 
prevail  still  more  widely  and  pervade  still  more  deeply," 
was  abundantly  answered.  The  gospel  lectures  found 
among  their  hearers,  men  of  light  and  leading,  Hindu, 
Brahmo,  and  Parsi,  who  had  never  before  listened  to  a 
distinctive,  evangelical  appeal.  Nay,  some  of  them  were 
delivered  under  the  acquiescing  presidency  of  Brahmo  and 
Hindu  representatives,  while  all  elicited  from  non-Chris- 
tians and  Christians  alike,  repeated  plaudits  of  approval. 
We  are  firmly  persuaded  that  Dr.  Barrows  has  been  used 
of  God  to  draw  out,  and  make  patent,  some  of  the  invisible 
trophies  of  Missions,  and  that  the  outlook  is  bound  to  be 
an  enthusiastic  revival  of  the  missionary  spirit  in  the 
Homes  of  Missions.  He  has  taken  his  stand  on  the  same 
evangelical  foundations  which  are  exhibited  in  the  apos- 
tolic mission  of  the  missionaries.  Dr.  Barrows  has  illus- 
trated, further,  that,  while  the  recognition  of  truth,  wher- 
ever it  was  found,  was  an  imperative  obligation  on  the  part 
of  every  true  man,  such  recognition,  properly  viewed,  was 
a  source  of  strength,  rather  than  of  weakness,  to  Chris- 
tianity. 


APPENDIX.  345 

The  Indian  Witness.,  of  Calcutta,  said : 
We  very  much  doubt  whether  India  has  ever  been 
favored  with  so  worthy  a  presentation  of  the  Christian 
faith.  .  .  .  The  lectures  are  a  magnificent  contribution 
to  the  Christian  evidences,  well  worthy  of  a  permanent 
place  in  literature.  Many  competent  critics  have  pro- 
nounced the  lecture  on  the  Universal  Book  the  finest  pre- 
sentation of  the  incomparable  place  in  the  world's  life  and 
literature  of  the  Christian  Scriptures  which  they  have  read 
or  heard. 

Of  the  closing  lecture,  the  Indian  Witness  re- 
marks that  it 

Was  a  masterly  presentation  of  the  claims  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith  upon  all  men,  and  in  every  way  a  worthy  comple- 
tion of  what  must  be  regarded  as  the  ablest  course  of  lec- 
tures on  Christian  subjects  to  which  the  Indian  commun- 
ity, of  the  present  generation  at  least,  has  been  permitted 
to  listen. 

The  Indian  Evangelical  Review,  of  Calcutta,  said: 

Opportunity  of  discussion  and  controversy  was  not  given 
on  the  floor  of  the  Parliament;  but  the  opportunity  was 
given  and  largely  availed  of  on  the  larger  arena  of  the  pub- 
lic press  and  on  public  platforms,  with  the  result  that 
instead  of  the  missionaries  suffering  in  reputation  or  the 
work  of  foreign  missions  being  discredited,  it  is  "the  pic- 
turesque fascinating  orators  who  championed  the  cause" 
of  the  non-Christian  religions  who  have  been  discredited, 
as  is  always  the  case  when  the  libelled  Christian  has  got 
the  indictment  or  book  which  his  adversary  has  written. 

But  what  are  the  net  results  of  the  Parliament  of  1893? 
We  would  answer,  first  of  all,  a  widespread  approach  toward 
the  Christian  platform  on  the  part  of  the  more  educated 
members  of  the  non-Christian  community.  They  are 
pleased  with  the  Parliament  of  Religions  as  an  expression 
of  Christian  love  and  sympathy  towards,  and  interest  in, 
the  devotees  of  non-Christian  religions.  Love  begets  love, 
and  sympathy  begets  gratitude.     This   love  and  this  sym- 


346    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

pathy  have  drawn  many  towards  Christ  who  previously 
stood  aloof.  In  the  second  place,  to  the  Parliament  of 
Religions  we  owe  the  able,  evangelical  and  apostolic  lec- 
tures of  the  Rev.  Dr.  John  Henry  Barrows.  And  we  add 
that  different  from  the  lectures  of  all  other  temporary  vis- 
itors to  India,  Dr.  Barrows's  lectures  will  live  and  be  a 
power  and  an  arsenal  of  munition  long  after  we  and  the 
lecturer  have  left  behind  us  all  earthly  activities.  They 
made  a  deep  and  lasting  impression  upon  those  who  heard 
them  delivered  and  many  of  these  were  men  who  never 
heard  Christian  addresses  before ;  we  believe  they  will  be 
much  more  widely  known,  and  known  for  generations  yet 
to  come,  as  a  printed  volume.  In  the  third  place,  we 
expect  such  Christian  lectures  to  be  delivered  every  second 
year  in  perpetuity  on  Mrs.  Haskell's  Foundation,  and  issue 
in  the  publication  of  works  of  a  permanent  apologetic  value, 
prepared  specially  for  the  intelligent  English-educated 
young  men  of  India.  The  first  series  of  the  Haskell-Bar- 
rows  Lectures,  we  hope  will  prove  a  true  earnest  and  sam- 
ple of  those  which  are  to  follow.  We  desire  no  better^ 
none  more  loyal  to  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Jesus,  and  none 
more  faithful  to  the  non-Christian  faiths  and  their  follow- 
ers. Another  good  thing  which  Dr.  Barrows  has  done  by 
his  lectures  was  to  correct  untruths,  and  to  supplement 
half-truths  industriously  circulated  by  Christians  and  non- 
Christians.  This  itself  is  no  small  gain.  One  word  more: 
the  Calcutta  Missionary  Conference  which  met  after  five  of 
the  six  lectures  were  delivered,  were  enthusiastic  and 
unanimous  in  their  appreciation  of  the  lectures  and  in 
praise  of  the  University  of  Chicago,  whose  commissioner 
he  is,  and  of  Mrs.  Caroline  E.  Haskell,  by  whose  Christian 
liberality  the  Lectureship  was  founded. 

The  Hindu,  of  Madras,  one  of  the  ablest  of  the 
non-Christian  journals  of  India,  said: 

Dr.  Barrows  is  certainly  to  be  congratulated  on  the 
impression  he  has  produced  as  a  lecturer.  There  is  an 
unanimous  feeling  that  he  possesses  great  powers  of  expo- 
sition and  a  thorough  knowledge  of  his  subject.  More 
than  all,  he  has  evidently   a   great  love    for  the  people  of 


APPENDIX.  347 

this  country  and  some  appreciation  for  their  good  quali- 
ties, and  especially  for  their  intellectual  keenness  and 
aptitude  for  metaphysical  controversy. 

But  no  reference  to  the  lectures  has  been  more 
honorable  to  India  than  the  noble  sentiment  of 
the  Indian  Social  Reformer^  the  courageous  organ 
of  the  reformers  in  Madras.  Differing  from  Dr. 
Barrows  in  standpoint  and  in  belief,  this  paper 
spoke  the  following  true  words  about  the  lecturer's 
utterances: 

It  has,  we  see,  been  made  a  point  against  Dr.  Barrows 
that  he  claims  a  position  for  Christianity  superior  to  that 
of  any  other  religion.  We  are,  of  course,  not  prepared  to 
concede  that  claim.  But  we  never  expected  that  Dr.  Bar- 
rows would  condescend  to  waive  that  claim  for  his  own 
faith,  and  if  he  had  done  so,  we,  for'  one,  should  not  have 
very  much  cared  to  listen  to  what  he  has  to  say. 

And  we  regard  as  the  outcome  of  sheer  intellectual 
indolence  and  pusillanimity,  the  opinion  which  is  fashion- 
able nowadays  that  one  conviction,  one  faith,  is  as  good 
as  another.  We  regard  this  easy-going  fashion  of  mind 
as  fraught  with  the  greatest  danger  to  the  future  of  this 
country.  For  it  means  isolation ;  it  spells  death.  The 
vice,  wherever  and  in  whatever  form  it  prevails,  is  the 
child  of  pure  selfishness. 

The  religion  of  the  future  will  no  doubt  have  affinities 
with  each  of  the  existing  religions,  just  as  the  human  race 
has  affinities  with  the  anthropoid  apes.  We,  therefore, 
welcome  Dr.  Barrows's  statement  of  the  claims  of  his 
faith.  If  they  are  exaggerated  or  imaginary,  they  will  go 
to  the  wall  of  their  own  accord.  If  they  are  real,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  may  so  happen  that  some  courageous  souls 
that  have  been  seeking  the  light,  and  not  found  it,  may  be 
impressed  with  them  and  may  be  led  to  transform  them- 
selves into  the  receptacle  of  a  greatness  such  as  an  exalted 
religious  idea  alone  can  bestow.  We  invite  our  friends 
to  give  their  unbiased  hearing  to  Dr.  Barrows.  To  be 
afraid  of  being   converted   to   his   views   is  cowardice.     No 


348    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

man  who  is  afraid  of  having  to  relinquish  his  preposses- 
sions need  call  himself  a  religious  man  or  a  lover  of  truth. 
His  proper  place  is  in  the  vegetable  kingdom,  where  to  be 
uprooted  is  to  perish.  The  human  vegetable  is  the  most 
despicable  of  human  things. 

The  motto  of  the  Parliament  of  Religions  was: 
"Have  we  not  all  one  Father?  hath  not  one  God 
created  us?"  It  is  true.  There  is  but  one  God, 
and  He  is  the  Father  of  every  one  of  us,  and  He 
will  draw  all  His  children  more  and  more  to  Him- 
self and  more  and  more  to  one  another.  It  is  in 
love  to  Him  and  in  love  to  India  that  these  Lectures 
were  devised  and  were  prepared,  and  have  been  de- 
livered, and  are  now  given  to  the  press.  The 
present  writer  counts  it  an  honor  and  a  privilege  to 
write  these  words  of  introduction.  He  believes 
that  many  in  our  beloved  India  will  read  the  Lec- 
tures with  thoughtfulness  and  earnestness,  and  find 
them  a  help  in  becoming  intimate  with  God  our 
Father  and  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  "And  this  is 
life  eternal  that  they  might  know  Thee,  the  only 
true  God,  and  Jesus  Christ  whom  thou  hast  sent." 
And,  before  reading  our  brother's  message  about 
our  Father  and  His  revelation  of  Himself,  let  us 
humbly  and  sincerely  pray  the  universal  prayer 
which  was  daily  prayed  at  the  World's  First  Parlia- 
ment of  Religions:  "Our  Father  which  art  in 
heaven,  hallowed  be  Thy  name.  Thy  kingdom 
come.  Thy  will  be  done  in  earth,  as  it  is  in  heaven. 
Give  us  this  day  our  daily  bread.  And  forgive  us 
our  debts,  as  we  forgive  our  debtors.  And  lead  us 
not  into  temptation,  but  deliver  us  from  evil:  for 
Thine  is  the  kingdom,  and  the  power,  and  the 
glory,  for  ever. — Amen." 

Ahmednagar,  August  25,   1897. 


NOTES. 


NOTES. 

LECTURE    I. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    FOR    FIRST    LECTURE. 

On  the  general  topic  of  the  religious  element  in  man,  see: 
Saussaye,   Manual  of  the  Science  of  Religion,  Chapter  3. 

(A    summary    of    the     whole      discussion     between 

Spencer,  Tyler,  Max  Mliller,  and  others.) 
D'Alviella,  Hibbert   Lectures,    1891,    Origin  and  Growth 

of  the  Conception  of  God,  Lecture  2. 
James    Freeman   Clarke,    Ten   Great  Religions,   Vol.   II, 

p.  17  ff. 
S.  H.  Kellogg,  Genesis  and  Grotuth  of  Religion,  Lecture  2. 

On  the  development  of  the  religious  element  in  man,  see: 
Menzies,  History  of  Religion,  Part  I. 

Baring-Gould,  Origin  and  Development  of  Religious  Belief. 
Two  volumes. 

On  the  necessity  of  religion,  see: 

John  Caird,  Introduction  to  the  Philosophy  of  Religion, 
Chapter  4. 

Pfleiderer,  Philosophy  and  Development  of  Religion, 
Gifford  Lectures,  Vol.  I. 

Pfleiderer,  Philosophy  of  Religion,  Vol.  Ill,  Section  i. 

See  also  upon  the  general  subject,  E.  Caird,  The  Evo- 
lution of  Religion,  Vol.  I,  Lecture  i. 

Jevons,  Introduction  to  the  History  of  Religion,  Chapters 
1-3,  etc. 

C.  M.  Tyler,  D.  D.,  Bases  of  Religious  Belief. 

On  Islam  and  Buddhism  as  missionary  religions,  see: 

C.  R.  Haines,  Islam  as  a  Missionary  Religion,  S.  P.  C.  K., 
1889. 

351 


352     CHRISTIANITV,   THE   V.ORLD-RELKUON. 

A.  Scott,  D.  D.,   Biiddhis?ii  and  Christianity,   Lecture  6, 

p.  318  ff. 
Dods,  Mohammed,  Buddha,  and  Christ,  passim. 
On  the  universal  character  of  Christianity,  see: 

Fremantle,   The  World  as  the  Subject  of  Redemption. 
Kuenen,     N'ational    Religions   and     Universal  Religions, 

p.  292. 
G.  M.  Grant,   The  Religions  of  the    World  in   Relation  to 

Christianity. 

Note  i,  p.   26. 

Max  Muller  writes: 

"  A  distinction  has  been  made  for  us  between  religion 
and  philosophy,  and,  so  far  as  form  and  object  are  con- 
cerned, I  do  not  deny  that  such  a  distinction  may  be  useful. 
But  when  we  look  to  the  subjects  with  which  religion  is  con- 
cerned, they  are,  and  always  have  been,  the  very  subjects 
on  which  philosophy  has  dwelt,  nay,  from  which  philosophy 
has  sprung.  If  religion  depends  for  its  very  life  on  the 
sentiment  or  the  perception  of  the  infinite  within  the  finite 
and  beyond  the  finite,  who  is  to  determine  the  legitimacy 
of  that  sentiment  or  of  that  perception,  if  not  the  philoso- 
pher ?  Who  is  to  determine  the  powers  which  man  possesses 
for  apprehending  the  finite  by  his  senses,  for  working  up 
his  single  and  therefore  finite  impressions  into  concepts  by 
his  reason,  if  not  the  philosopher?  And  who,  if  not  the 
philosopher,  is  to  find  out  whether  man  can  claim  the 
right  of  asserting  the  existence  of  the  infinite,  in  spite  of  the 
constant  opposition  of  sense  and  reason,  taking  these 
words  in  their  usual  meaning?  We  should  damnify  relig- 
ion if  we  separated  it  from  philosophy;  we  should  ruin 
philosophy  if  we  divorced  it  from  religion."  Hibbert 
Lectures,  1878,    The  Origin  and  Growth  of  Religion,  pp.  337-8. 

In  speaking  of  the  great  Hindu  philosophies,  as  contain- 
ing matters  of  chiefly  intellectual  interest,  I  do  not  mean 
to  deny  their  religious  significance,  nor  do  I  express  an 
opinion  favorable  to  any  divorce  of  religion  from  philoso- 
phy. I  hope  that  in  these  lectures  I  have,  at  least,  indi- 
cated the  fundamental  principles  of  the  Christian  philosophy. 
Going   to   India    with   a   supremely   practical   purpose,  and 


NOTES.  353 

realizing  that  the  Hindu  mind  has  made  religion  chiefly  a 
matter  of  speculation,  I  felt  that  my  best  service  would  be 
rendered  by  setting  forth  the  ethical  and  spiritual  aspects 
of  the  Christian  faith.  The  following  citations  from  men 
who  know  the  present  condition  and  needs  of  thoughtful 
Hindus  are  of  interest. 

In  one  of  his  valuable  reports  of  work  among  educated 
classes,  the  Rev.  T.  E.  Slater,  of  Bangalore,  says: 

"  Christianity  and  Hinduism  are  now  meeting  face  to 
face;  and  the  great  lament  which  we  as  missionaries  have 
to  raise,  is  in  respect  to  the  tone  of  mind  generally  prevalent 
in  the  country.  To  so  many  minds,  religious  truths  appear 
to  be  little  more  than  the  material  on  which  to  exercise  the 
ingenuity  of  controversy  and  speculation.  There  is 
enough  and  to  spare  of  criticism  and  discussion  ;  but  serious 
thought  and  earnest  inquiry  are  very  rare.  Besides  the 
spirit  of  false  patriotism  that  is  abroad,  the  materialistic 
tendency  of  the  age  deadens  the  concern  for  spiritual 
things.  Interest  in  merely  worldly  pursuits  and  in 
amassing  wealth  seems  to  be  just  now  all-absorbing,  and 
the  'gospel  of  getting  on'  gains  more  hearers  than  any 
other." 

In  a  lecture  on  Universal  Religion,  delivered  in  Banga- 
lore, November,  1896,  p.  7,  Rev.  Edward  P.  Rice,  B.  A., 
says: 

"  One  not  unfrequently  meets  with  those  who  say  that 
a  man  cannot  judge  whether  his  ancestral  religion  is  true 
or  not  unless  he  reads  all  the  Sastras  and  the  commentaries 
thereon.  The  reflection  which  such  a  statement  at  once 
suggests  is  that  the  religion  which  requires  a  pundit  to 
understand  it  and  to  see  its  reasonableness  may  be  a  very 
profound  one,  but  it  cannot  be  the  Universal  Religion." 

In  a  lecture  on  Liberal  Education  in  India,  p.  19,  Pro- 
fessor N.  G.  Welinkar,  of  Wilson  College,  Bombay,  has  ably 
shown  some  of  the  weaknesses  of  the  present  training  of 
the  Hindus: 

"The  greatest  lack  in  the  education  imparted  in  the 
majority  of  Indian  colleges  is  the  religious  element;  and 
therefore  in  common  with  many  enlightened  friends  of 
liberal  education  in  India,   both  Christian  and  non-Chris- 


354    CHRISTIANITl-,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

tian,  I  rejoice  at  the  existence  in  the  midst  of  our  educa- 
tional system  of  missionary  colleges  where  the  essentially 
religious  basis  of  all  sound  education — and  particularly  of 
western  education — is  steadily  kept  in  view,  and  where 
those  great  truths  are  presented  to  the  rising  generations 
of  Indians,  on  the  acceptance  of  which  alone  depends  all 
progress  in  the  paths  of  true  enlightenment  and  knowl- 
edge." 

Note  2,  p.  27. 

"Thus,  beneath  and  beyond  what  we  may  call  our 
secular  consciousness  in  all  its  forms,  beneath  and  beyond 
all  our  consciousness  of  finite  objects  and  of  the  subjective 
interests  and  desires  that  bind  us  to  them,  there  is  always 
a  religious  consciousness,  the  consciousness  of  an  infinite 
or  Divine  Being,  who  is  the  source  of  all  existence  and  of 
all  knowledge,  and  in  whom  we  and  all  things  'live  and 
move  and  have  our  being.'  "  The  Evolution  of  Religion, 
Edward  Caird,  Vol.  I.  p.  85. 

"The  theological  interpretation  of  the  universe  is,  with 
the  chief  thinkers  from  Plato  to  Hegel,  its  final  interpre- 
tation, the  natural  interpretation  elevated  in  and  by  the 
supernatural,  which  last  is  itself  enriched  by  every  discov- 
ery of  natural  science.  When  nature  is  seen  to  be  God 
acting,  so  that  each  discovery  in  natural  science  is  also  a 
contribution  to  natural  theology,  it  seems  evident  that  col- 
lision between  advancing  science  and  religious  faith  is  not 
possible."     Pliilosophy  of  Theism,  A.  C.  Fraser,   p.  296. 

Note  3,  p.  28. 

"The  thought  and  feeling  of  divine  immanence  in  all 
natural  appearances ;  of  the  finite  being  pervaded  by  and 
sustained  in  what  is  infinite, — comes  out,  in  ancient  and 
modern  poetry  and  religion,  as  the  intense  expression  of  a 
theism  so  conscious  of  the  uniqueness  and  pervadingness 
of  the  Divine  as  to  refuse  to  place  God  apart — one  among 
many.  Hebrew  literature,  with  its  abundant  representa- 
tions of  God,  still  leads  up  to  the  idea  of  divine  presence 
latent  in  the  heart  of  reality."  Philosophy  of  Theism,  A.  C. 
Fraser,  p.  152. 


NOTES.  355 

Note  4,  p.  30. 

"The  sea  of  Faith 
Was  once,  too,  at  the  full,  and  round  earth's  shore 
Lay  like  the  folds  of  a  bright  girdle  furl'd. 
But  now  I  only  hear 

Its  melancholy,  long,  withdrawing  roar. 
Retreating,  to  the  breath 

Of  the  night-wind,  down  the  vast  edges  drear 
And  naked  shingles  of  the  world." 

— Dover  Beach,  by  Matthew  Arnold. 

It  is  now  evident  that  Matthew  Arnold  and  others  mis- 
took a  temporary  backward  current  for  a  permanent  ten- 
dency. It  is  not  unusual  for  Hindu  journals  to  quote  from 
skeptical  European  writers  of  a  generation  ago  who  do  not 
represent  present  opinion.  To  a  coosiderable  degree  India 
gave  credit  to  incorrect  reports  made  by  a  few  returning 
delegates  to  the  Parliament  of  Religions.  On  reaching 
Bombay  I  had  occasion  to  speak  as  follows: 

"  The  Christian  people  of  America  were  hospitable  to 
the  delegates  from  other  lands  and  faiths,  and  heard  and 
read  with  much  interest  and  genuine  sympathy  the  repre- 
sentations of  non-Christian  religions.  This  interest  and 
courtesy  were,  in  some  cases,  misinterpreted.  Some  of  the 
Japanese  Buddhist  delegates  returned  home  with  the  idea, 
which  they  spread  far  and  wide,  that  America  was  losing 
faith  in  Christianity  and  was  hungering  for  the  bread  of 
life  which  Buddhism  had  to  offer.  Nothing  could  be  more 
absurd.  America  is  not  losing  faith  in  the  Christian  relig- 
ion. Its  progress  in  the  United  States  during  the  last 
twenty-five  years  has  been  more  rapid  than  ever  before. 
In  the  building  of  new  churches;  in  the  vast  additions  to 
church  membership,  numbering  nearly  half  a  million  every 
year;  in  the  building  of  mission-schools  in  our  great  cities, 
and  the  pushing  of  mission-work  on  our  wide  frontier  of 
new  settlements ;  in  the  spread  of  Sunday  Schools ;  in  the 
marvellous  growth  of  the  Christian  Endeavor  movement, 
and  of  similar  young  people's  societies,  which  probably 
number  three  millions  of  members  in  the  United  States 
alone;  in  the  great  sums  given  to  Christian  colleges;  and  in 


35^    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

the  many  millions  of  dollars  annually  raised  to  send  to 
other  lands  the  messengers  of  the  Gospel, — in  all  this,  and 
in  the  steadily  growing  purpose  to  put  the  gentle  and 
humane  teachings  of  Jesus  into  the  daily  life,  and  to  make 
them  effective  in  the  relations  of  men  with  each  other,  we 
have  indisputable  evidences  that  Christianity  is  a  grow- 
ingly  powerful,  beneficent  influence. 

"People  going  to  America  from  the  Orient  are  easily 
liable  to  misunderstand  the  interest  and  courtesy  with 
which  they  are  received.  Curious  to  hear  all  truth,  the 
American  people  listen  eagerly  to  lectures  on  the  Vedanta 
philosophy  or  on  Esoteric  Buddhism,  and  continue  to  go 
to  their  own  churches,  cherish  their  own  Christian  faith, 
and  do  their  own  Christian  work  as  before.  Naturally  our 
Oriental  visitors  are  most  earnestly  courted  by  Americans 
who,  for  one  reason  or  another,  are  not  in  sympathy  with 
evangelical  Christian  beliefs.  And  I  have  noticed  that 
persons  who  have  gone  away  from  historic  Christianity 
sometimes  think  that  everybody  is  about  to  follow  them. 
But  this  is  not  so.  Our  carefully  prepared  Government 
census  shows  that  the  evangelical  believers  in  America 
outnumber  the  non-evangelical  of  all  denominations  more 
than  one  hundred  to  one."      Times  of  India,  Dec.  17,  1896. 

Note  5,  p.  31. 

The  following  remarks  by  one  of  the  most  thoughtful  of 
the  American  missionaries  in  India  indicate  a  change  which 
is  both  marked  and  hopeful: 

"A  few  years  ago  the  raising  of  this  question  [the  origin 
of  Hinduism]  would,  in  itself,  have  been  considered  a  dis- 
ability in  one  who  aspired  to  become  a  missionary.  It  was 
laid  down  as  a  fundamental  postulate  of  his  belief  that 
Hinduism  was  of  the  devil,  and  that,  coming  from  below, 
it  must  be  shunned  as  a  study  and  denounced  root  and 
branch  as  a  thing  purely  Satanic.  It  is  not  too  much  to 
say  that  this  theory  has  entirely  given  way  to  a  more 
rational  belief."  Rev.  J.  P.  Jones,  D.D.,  in  The  Harvest 
Field,  March,  1897,   p.  83. 

"  Modern  scholarship  is  practically  of  one  voice  in  main- 
taining   that  God    hath    not    left   himself  without  witness 


NOTES.  357 

among  the  many  nations  of  the  earth — a  witness  that  has 
indeed  been  comparatively  feeble — a  revelation  that  is  dim 
and  star-like  as  compared  with  the  noon-day  brightness  of 
the  Sun  of  Righteousness  in  the  Christian  religion.  The 
day  has  come  when  the  missionary  must  accept  and 
believe  that  God  has  been  dealing  directly  with  this  people 
through  the  many  centuries  of  their  history,  leading  them 
to  important  truth,  even  though  their  evil  hearts  and  worse 
lives  have  caused  them,  in  many  cases,  to  'change  the 
truth  of  God  into  a  lie  and  worship,  and  serve  the  creature 
more  than  the  Creator.'  Many  of  the  truths  which  are 
imbedded  in  the  religion  of  the  land  find  their  solution  in 
no  other  hypothesis  than  this."  Rev.  J.  P.  Jones,  D.D.,  in 
The  Harvest  Field,  March,  1897,  p.  84. 

Note  6,  p.  32. 

In  considering  Mohammedanism,  Hinduism,  Confucian- 
ism, and  Buddhism  as  the  faiths  which  dispute  with  Chris- 
tianity the  conquest  of  the  globe,  I  do  not  mean  to  imply 
any  lack  of  appreciation  of  other  religions,  some  of  which 
may  be  considered  as  of  a  higher  type  than  these  four.  The 
Sikhs  of  India  are  an  interesting  people  and  their  religion 
contains  noble  elements,  but  their  faith  is  not  so  wide- 
spread as  to  reach  and  influence  even  the  land  of  its  birth. 

"The  Sikh  religion  may  be  considered  as  localized  in 
the  Panjab,  for  though  there  are  members  of  this  faith  in 
most  provinces,  g8  per  cent  of  them  are  returned  from  its 
birthplace."  General  Report  on  the  Census  of  India,  1891, 
p.  176. 

Parsiism,  more  ancient  than  the  religion  of  the  Sikhs, 
and  one  of  the  highest  forms  of  non-Christian  faith,  has  not 
extended  itself  widely  enough  to  be  deemed  even  an  Indian 
faith. 

"As  the  Sikhs  appertain  specially  to  the  Panjab,  so  the 
Zoroastrian  religion  is  almost  confined  to  the  Western 
Presidency  and  states  surrounding  it.  The  early  settle- 
ments of  the  Parsis  at  Nausari,  in  the  Baroda  State,  and  in 
Surat  and  Broach,  still  contain  about  30.4  per  cent  of  the 
entire  community,  and  their  original  fire  temple  at  Udwada 
on   the   Surat   coast   has    maintained    its    supreme   repute. 


358    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

But  the  headquarters  of  the  race  have  been  gradually 
shifted  to  Bombay,  where  there  are  now  52.8  per  cent 
returned."  Geiteral  Report  on  the  Census  of  India,  1891, 
p.  176. 

The  Jains  have  close  connection  in  several  ways  both 
with  Buddhism  and  Hinduism.  Their  benevolence  and  their 
kindness  toward  animals  are  highly  praiseworthy.  This 
faith  numbers  a  million  and  a  half  adherents. 

"It  is  remarkable  that  in  the  country  of  its  birth,  Par- 
asnath  in  South  Bihar,  there  should  be  no  more  than  one 
thousand  four  hundred  and  eighty-seven  of  this  religion 
returned  at  the  census.  From  evidence  indirectly  afforded 
by  applications  made  from  the  neighboring  tract  just  be- 
fore the  census,  it  seems  highly  probable  that  in  this  part 
of  the  country,  instead  of  desiring  to  emphasize  the  dis- 
tinction of  their  religion  from  Brahmanism,  as  was  the  case 
at  Delhi,  etc.,  the  Jains  are  anxious  to  efface  it,  as  their  so- 
cial position  is  evidently  based  on  caste  orthodoxy  within 
the  Brahmanic  fold.  If  this  tendency  be  true,  it  will  ac- 
count for  the  disappearance  of  the  Jains  into  the  general 
sea  of  Hinduism."  General  Report  on  the  Census  of  India, 
1891,  p.  176. 

"The  Jains  are  widespread  over  India,  though  they  form 
an  appreciable  numerical  element  in  the  population  only  in 
Rajputana,  Ajmer,  and  Western  India,  and  nowhere  reach 
five  per  cent  of  the  total.  It  is  worth  notice  that  they  seem 
to  flourish  most  where  they  have  devoted  themselves  to 
trade  and  commerce,  and  are  weak  in  number  where  they 
have  become  agriculturists."  General  Report  on  the  Cen- 
sus of  India,  1 891,  p.  176. 

Note  7,  p.  38. 

"The  Christian  ought  not  to  rest  satisfied  with  the 
vague  general  idea  that  Hinduism  is  a  form  of  heathenism 
with  which  he  has  nothing  to  do,  save  to  help  in  destroying 
it.  Let  him  try  to  realize  the  ideas  of  the  Hindus  regarding 
God,  and  the  soul,  and  sin,  and  salvation,  and  heaven,  and 
hell,  and  the  many  sore  trials  of  this  mortal  life.  He  will 
then  certainly  have  a  much  more  vivid  perception  of  the 
Divine   origin    and    transcendent    importance   of   his   own 


NOTES.  359 

religion.  Further,  he  will  then  extend  a  helping  hand  to 
his  eastern  brother  with  far  more  of  sensibility  and  tender- 
ness; and,  in  proportion  to  the  measure  of  his  loving 
sympathy  will  doubtless  be  the  measure  of  his  success.  A 
yearning  heart  will  accomplish  more  than  the  most  cogent 
argument."  Non-Christian  Religions  of  the  World — The 
Hindu  Religion,  J.  Murray  Mitchell,  p.  4. 

Note  8,  p.  39. 

One  of  the  foremost  men  of  India  is  Behramji  M.  Mala- 
bari,  editor  of  The  Spectator  of  Bombay.  As  poet,  scholar, 
and  reformer  he  is  esteemed  both  in  Great  Britain  and 
in  India.  In  a  sketch  of  his  life  and  times,  by  R.  P. 
Karkaria,  we  learn  that  he  came  under  the  powerful  influ- 
ence of  Rev.  Dr.  Wilson. 

"Dr.  Wilson,  then,  failed  to  make  him  a  Christian,  but 
he  succeeded  in  making  him  a  better  man,  inspired  by  all 
that  is  good  and  true  in  the  Christian  faith  superadded  to 
that  of  his  own.  And  if  the  venerable  missionary  had  lived 
longer  he  would  certainly  have  been  proud  of  the  moral 
and  religious  development  of  his  protege."  India,  Forty 
Years  of  Progress  and  Reform,  R.  P.  Karkaria,  p.  80. 

Malabari  has  labored  not  only  to  promote  social  reform 
in  India,  but  to  bring  men  of  different  faiths  and  races  into 
more  fraternal  relations.  His  appreciation  of  the  work  of 
Prof.  Max  Miiller  in  the  same  direction  is  well  known. 

"He  has  labored  all  his  life  to  bring  about  a  union 
amongst  nations.  That  union  has  long  been  aimed  at.  A 
marriage  between  East  and  West  was  arranged  even  before 
the  days  of  the  illustrious  William  Jones.  Even  the  silver 
wedding  is  gone  and  past.  In  that  work  of  union  you 
trace  the  hand  of  a  higher  power  than  of  man.  Modern 
Indian  history  teaches  you  that.  But  I  may  say  that  Max 
Miiller  and  his  contemporaries  have  contributed  largely  to 
bringing  to  the  surface  the  practical  result  of  that  process 
of,  let  us  hope,  progressive  union.  By  his  Rig-Veda 
Samhita,  and  other  works,  Max  Miiller  has  given  new 
birth,  so  to  say,  to  Sanskrit:  he  has  resuscitated,  I  say  he 
has  helped  to  regenerate,  the  language  and  literature  of 
our  land."     Behramji  M.  Malabari,  D.  Gidumal,  pp.  162-3. 


360    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

The  more  enlightened  minds  of  India  are  not  wanting 
in  a  clear,  comprehensive  and  grateful  understanding  of 
the  advantages  which  have  come  to  India  from  her  con- 
tact with  western  civilization. 

"Macaulay  and  Bentinck  were  justified  in  their  expecta- 
tions of  the  enormous  benefits  to  accrue  to  the  Indian  races 
from  English  education.  During  the  last  two  generations 
India  has  gone  through  a  new  and  unique  development, 
fraught  with  momentous  consequences  to  itself  and  to  the 
British  Empire.  Under  Western  influences  the  former 
traditional  moorings  are  already  being  gradually  left 
behind,  and  the  educated  classes  are  drifting  towards 
another  goal."  India,  Forty  Years  of  Progress  and  Reform, 
R.  P.  Karkaria,  p.  13. 

"The  many  noble  deeds  of  philanthropy  and  self-denying 
benevolence  which  Christian  missionaries  have  performed 
in  India,  and  the  various  intellectual,  social,  and  moral 
improvements  which  they  have  effected,  need  no  flattering 
comment;  they  are  treasured  in  the  gratitude  of  the  nation, 
and  can  never  be  forgotten  or  denied."  Lectures  in  India, 
Keshub  Chunder  Sen,  p.  15. 

Note  9,  p.  40. 

In  an  interview  published  in  The  Madras  Standard, 
Feb.  13th,  1897,  I  said:  I  am  profoundly  impressed  with 
the  lack  of  unity  prevailing  in  India.  It  is  an  aggregation 
of  peoples,  governments,  religions,  and  classes  where 
the  divisions  are  woeful  indeed.  It  is  perfectly  evident 
that,  if  the  wise,  restraining  hand  of  British  rule  were 
removed,  chaos  would  prevail  and  the  Hindus  and  Moham- 
medans in  some  places  would  be  flying  at  each  others' 
throats.  There  are  few  countries  where  religious  intoler- 
ance seems  so  general  and  cruel  as  here.  India  is  living 
in  a  state  of  society  which,  so  far  as  religious  tolerance  is 
concerned,  appears  to  us  Americans  most  distressing.  The 
alphabet  of  true  toleration  has  yet  to  be  learnt  by  great 
sections  of  the  community.  I  know  that  Hinduism  is  will- 
ing that  men  should  hold  a  variety  of  incongruous  creeds, 
but  religion  is  not  merely  a  creed;  it  is  also  a  life  where 
the  conditions   and   environments   ought   to  be  in  harmony 


NOTES.  361 

with  the  inner  convictions.  The  religions  of  India  have 
been  trying  here,  as  at  the  Parliament  of  Religions,  to 
make  themselves  as  Christian  as  possible.  But  when  mem- 
bers of  the  Hindu  community,  convinced  of  the  truth  and 
rightful  claims  of  Christianity,  prepare  to  confess  Christ  and 
enter  into  fellowship  with  His  people,  these  Christian  dis- 
ciples still  meet  relentless  and  often  cruel  opposition.  They 
are  sometimes  disowned,  prohibited  from  seeing  their 
own  relations,  deprived  of  just  inheritances,  assailed  with 
falsehood,  with  blows,  and  now  and  then  tortured.  Some 
of  the  noblest  specimens  of  human  character  and  some 
of  the  finest  and  most  enlightened  intellects  which  I  have 
met  in  any  land  are  in  the  Native  Christian  Commu- 
nity of  India.  And  I  have  reason  to  believe  that  there  are 
many  thousands  of  educated  youths  who  are  convinced  that 
Christianity  is  true  but  who  are  still  held  back  from  de- 
claring their  faith  openly  by  reason  of  the  cruel  intolerance 
still  prevailing. 

Note  10,  p.  59. 

"When,  after  the  long  feuds  and  battles  of  the  middle 
ages,  Confucianism  stepped  the  second  time  into  the  Land 
of  Brave  Scholars,  it  was  no  longer  with  the  simple  rules 
of  conduct  and  ceremonial  of  the  ancient  days,  nor  was  it 
as  the  ally  of    Buddhism."      The  Religions  of  Japan,    GrifBs, 

p.  136- 

"The  new  Confucianism  came  to  Japan  as  the  system  of 
Chu  Hi.  For  three  centuries  this  system  has  already  held 
sway  over  the  intellect  of  China.  For  two  centuries  and  a 
half  it  had  dominated  the  minds  of  the  Samurai  so  that 
the  majority  of  them  to-day,  even  with  the  new  name  of 
Shizoku,  are  Confucianists  so  far  as  they  are  anything." 
The  Religions  of  Japan,  Griffis,  p.  136. 

"From  the  palace  downward  there  was  no  centralization 
of  authority  or  responsibility,  no  unity  of  counsel,  no  agree- 
ment as  to  action,  no  plan  of  campaign.  Stupefied  bewil- 
derment, helpless  inertia,  or  arrogant  contempt  for  the 
invader,  prevailed  alternately,  sometimes  simultaneously, 
in  every  yamen.  Each  man  was  absorbed  in  the  effort  to 
get  the  better  of  somebody  else,  and  to  make  something  for 


362    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

his  own  pocket  out  of  so  paying  a  concern  as  a  campaign. 
Viceroys  swindled  governors,  governors  swindled  generals, 
and  generals  swindled  subalterns.  There  were  infinite  and 
delicately-shaded  grades  of  peculation.  Of  patriotism,  or 
enthusiasm  for  the  war,  or  loyalty  to  the  dynasty,  or  self- 
respect  for  the  race,  there  was  not  a  sign.  Chinese  tele- 
graph-clerks sold  important  information  to  the  Japanese; 
Chinese  officers  accepted  bribes  to  retreat  or  to  surrender." 
Problems  of  the  Far  East,   Geo;  N.  Curzon,  M.P.,  p.  366. 

Note   ii,  p.  59. 

"The  Absolute  Religion  must  make  no  distinction 
between  Jew  and  Gentile,  Musselman  and  KaflSr,  Christian 
and  heathen,  Arya  and  Mleccha,  high  caste  and  low  caste, 
layman  and  ecclesiastic;  but  must  deal  with  each  individ- 
ual of  the  race  as  a  man."  Universal  Religion,  a  lecture 
delivered  at  Bangalore  in  Nov.  1896,  by  Edward  P.  Rice,  p.  6. 

Note  12,  p.  60. 

"If  Buddhism  has  gained  such  amazing  conquests  over 
Oriental  nations  could  not  Christianity,  with  a  similar  but 
far  superior  humanity  and  self-sacrifice,  and  with  the  true 
Son  of  God  to  present,  gain  still  greater  victories?  There 
seems  nothing  to  prevent  an  Oriental  who  has  hung  on  the 
words  of  Buddha  from  listening  even  more  intently  to  the 
words  of  Christ.  But  he  will  not  be  induced  to  do  so  by 
denunciations  of  such  a  sweet  and  loving  soul  as  Gautama. 
The  preacher  must  arm  himself  with  the  best  of  Buddha's 
truths,  and  then  show  the  higher  in  the  teachings  of  Jesus. 
He  must  offer  the  Fatherhood  of  God,  which  the  Hindu 
saint  never  mentally  grasped,  and  the  hope  of  a  conscious 
living  immortality,  which  the  great  Mystic  may  not  fully 
have  attained."      The  Unknown  God,  C.  Loring  Brace,  p.  312. 


LECTURE    II. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    FOR    SECOND    LECTURE. 

On  the  general  subject  of  the  effects  of  Christianity,  see: 
Storrs,   The  Divine  Origin  of  Christianity  Indicated  by  Its 

Historical  Effects. 
F.  W.  Farrar,   The  Witness  of  History  to  Christ. 
Fairbairn,  Religion  in  History  and  in  Modern  Life. 
C.  Loring  Brace,  Gesta  Christi. 
On  Christianity  and  the  Roman  Empire,  see: 

Merivale,  Conversion  of  the  Roman   Empire,   Boyle   Lec- 
ture, 1864. 
Uhlhorn,  Conflict  of  Christianity  with  Heathenism. 
The  same,  Christian  Charity  in  the  Ancient  Church. 
Lecky,    History  of  European   Morals  frotn   Augustus   to 
Charlemagne. 
On  Christianity  and  Social  Questions,  see: 

Peabody,  Ely,  Henderson,  and  Gladden,  in   the  Report 
of  the  Parliament  of  Religions. 

On  Christian  Missions,  see: 

Warneck,  History   of  Protestant   Missions,   translated  by 

Thomas  Smith,  D.D.,  1884. 
J.  S.  Dennis,  Foreign  Missions  after  a  Century. 
J.    S.    Dennis,    Christian    Missions   and   Social  Progress. 

(Very  valuable.) 
A.    C.    Thompson,    Protestant  Missions,    Their  Rise  and 

Early  Progress. 
E.  A.  Lawrence,  Modern  Missions  in  the  East. 
Report  of  World's  Congress  of  Missions,  Chicago,  1893. 

Note  i,  p.  71. 

"The  question  is  sometimes  asked,  What  is  the  influence 
of  Mohammedanism  upon  the  moral  character  of  Moslems? 

363 


364    CHRISriANITl',  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

In  reply  to  this  question,  it  must  be  admitted  that  wherever 
it  brings  to  its  allegiance  a  grossly  idolatrous  people,  espe- 
cially if  they  be  fetish-  or  devil-worshipers,  it  does  raise 
their  moral  status.  Cannibalism  and  infanticide  are  abol- 
ished; idolatrous  customs,  degrading  and  immoral,  are 
obliterated;  certain  fixed  rules  are  enforced  in  respect  to 
society  and  the  State;  thieves  and  murderers  are  severely 
punished;  the  use  of  intoxicating  drinks  is  greatly  dimin- 
ished if  not  absolutely  prevented;  children  are  educated  to 
some  extent  and  trained  up  as  the  worshipers  of  the  true 
God;  certain  ideas  of  honor,  courage  and  devotion  are 
inculcated,  and  so  the  scale  of  morality  is  greatly  ad- 
vanced ;  and  yet  there  is  a  limit  to  Moslem  progress  in  morals 
a  long  way  this  side  the  goal  of  Christian  ethics.  The  per- 
missions of  the  Koran  in  respect  to  polygamy,  concubinage 
and  divorce;  the  sanction  of  slavery  and  holy  war,  the 
example  of  Mohammed  himself,  the  adoption  of  the  prin- 
ciple that  the  end  justifies  the  means — thereby  consecrating 
every  form  of  deception  and  lying,  every  sort  of  persecu- 
tion and  violence  to  the  cause  of  religion — these  things 
effectually  block  the  wheels  of  progress  in  ethical  spheres, 
so  that  Moslem  nations  have  hardly  ever  reached  even  the 
planes  of  moral  purity  occupied  by  the  most  degenerate 
Christian  nations."  Isldm,  or  the  Religion  of  the  Tu?-k, 
E.   M.  Wherry,  p.  59. 

Note  2,  p.  80. 

"The  Hinduism  which  I  examined,  for  example,  in 
Benares  filled  me  with  pity  and  distress.  The  hideous  idol- 
atries which  I  have  witnessed  in  many  places  appear  to  me 
thoroughly  debasing  to  the  people.  I  know  what  excuses 
and  explanations  are  offered  by  the  pundits.  I  am  sorry 
that  they  think  the  common  and,  tome,  degrading  worship, 
is  fitted  to  an  unenlightened  population.  I  am  sorry  that 
they  do  not  cherish  a  loftier  faith  in  the  possibilities  of  the 
common  mind.  Even  granting,  which  I  do  not,  that  idol- 
atry is  fitted  to  national  infancy,  three  thousand  years  of 
idolatry  constitute  too  long  a  period  of  childish  enslave- 
ment. Christianity  in  three  hundred  years  swept  away, 
in  large  measure,  the  degrading  forms  of  Greek  and  Roman 


NOTES.  365 

polytheism.  I  know  that  there  are  hundreds  of  brave- 
hearted  reformers  in  India  who  are  hoping  and  working 
for  the  spiritual  uplifting  of  the  people,  and  I  wonder  that 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  educated  Hindus  do  not  devote 
themselves  to  a  similar  noble  task.  In  western  Christen- 
dom it  is  believed  that  the  lowliest  and  most  ignorant  are 
worthy  of  the  best  illumination,  and  the  preaching  of  the 
Gospel  to  the  poor  has  wrought  some  of  the  chief  marvels 
of  Christian  history.  We  have  found  that  the  humblest 
and  most  ignorant  can  be  brought  to  worship  God  (who  is 
spirit)  'in  spirit  and  in  truth.'  Instead  of  palliating  idolatry 
and  all  its  terrible  accompaniments  in  India,  the  edu- 
cated Hindu,  it  seems  to  me,  might  well  strive  to 
repeat,  with  better  accompaniments  and  without  any  sur- 
renderof  faith  in  the  great  God,  the  reformatory  and  ethical 
work  which  even  Buddhism  wrought  in  India  more  than 
two  thousand  years  ago. 

"Philosophic  Hinduism  is  another  thing,  and  the  repre- 
sentatives of  it  whom  I  have  met  are  men  not  only  of  intel- 
lectual acuteness  but  often  of  true  devoutness  of  spirit.  I 
should  esteem  them  even  more  highly  than  I  now  do  if 
their  lives  were  devoted  to  lifting  the  pall  of  ignorance 
from  this  poor  people,  and  I  am  sorry  that  they  are  not 
more  generally  willing  to  accept  and  proclaim  that  Chris- 
tian Gospel  which  I  believe,  more  firmly  if  possible  than 
ever  before,  is  the  only  sufficient  force  for  the  regeneration 
of  the  individual  and  of  society."  Interview  published  in 
the  Madras  Mail. 

Note  3,  p.  80. 

Throughout  Asia,  outside  the  dominion  of  Christian  and 
Mohammedan  thought,  faith  in  metempsychosis  is  a  fun- 
damental and  dominating  conception,  contributing  as 
much  as  any  other  idea  to  the  vast  distinctions  separating 
the  East  from  the  West.  President  W.  F.  Warren,  of  the 
Boston  University,  in  his  baccalaureate  address,  1897,  "Art 
Thou  a  Human  Being?"  elucidates  instructively  the  terri- 
ble significance  of  the  baseless  doctrine  of  transmigration. 

"Here  are  men  by  the  hundred  million  who  certainly 
know  not  what  it  is  to  be  a  man  ;  men  by  the  hundred  mil- 


366    CHRISTIANITV,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

lion  in  whose  estimation  the  innocent  instinctive  love  of 
conscious  personal  life  is  the  supreme  error,  the  supreme 
curse,  the  only  unpardonable  sin ;  men  by  the  hundred 
million  who  consider  themselves  and  all  beings  in  the 
total  cosmic  system  as  already  lost,  and  as  already  under- 
going seonian  punishment  for  sin  committed  in  unremem- 
bered  earlier  lives — a  punishment  which  can  never,  never 
cease  so  long  as  one  individual  consciousness  shall  cling 
to  life. 

"According  to  the  Buddha  and  to  all  advocates  of  metem- 
psychosis, the  Karma  which  became  embodied  and  per- 
petuated in  me  the  moment  I  began  to  be,  was  nothing 
that  belonged  to  my  father  or  mother,  or  to  any  of  their 
traceable  ancestors — it  was  something  that  belonged  to  a 
wholly  different  line  of  beings,  the  last  of  whom  ceased  the 
moment  I  began  my  life. 

"In  Buddhist  thought,  and  in  the  thought  of  all  believ- 
ers in  successive  incarnations  in  various  natures,  there 
neither  is  nor  can  be  any  such  thing  as  that  which  we  call 
the  human  race.  By  this  term  we  mean  the  total  aggrega- 
tion of  genealogically  inter-connected  human  individuals, 
living  or  dead,  born  or  yet  unborn,  the  whole  viewed  as 
one  in  nature,  one  in  origin,  one  in  rational  destination. 
Neither  the  Buddhist,  nor  the  believer  in  any  form  of  trans- 
migration proper,  knows  any  such  vital  unity  of  humanity. 
He  cannot.  Part  of  the  beings  that  have  been  members 
of  the  human  family  are  now  beasts  and  birds  and  reptiles 
— not  to  speak  of  yet  lower  or  higher  beings  of  non-human 
varieties.  A  short  time  ago,  all  that  to-day  are  men  were 
other  than  human,  and  a  short  time  hence  all  will  be 
human  no  longer.  Heredity  being  detached  from  the  line 
of  parentage,  the  family  is  necessarily  different  in  idea  and 
different  in  manifestation  from  what  it  is  in  the  Christian 
lands.  In  the  realm  of  civil  life  a  naturally  ordered  and 
conservatively  administered  state  is  impossible.  A  man 
to-day  may  be  a  woman  to-morrow.  Any  apparently  human 
ruler  is  liable  at  any  time  to  lay  aside  his  human  form  and 
take  a  year's  vacation  or  a  thousand  years'  vacation  among 
the  fairylike  goddesses,  or  among  the  demons,  or  among 
the  beasts   of  the   field.      Any   subject  of   the   government 


NOTES.  367 

caught  in  the  very  act  of  stealing  may  turn  out  to  be  a 
god  commendably  engaged  in  righting  some  ancient  wrong 
that  no  man  ever  heard  of." 

Note  4,  p.  82. 

In  partial  contrast,  however,  with  the  despondency  of 
the  Hindu  Christian  mentioned  by  Prof.  Max  Miiller,  note 
the  following  observations  of  the   Parsi  scholar,  Malabari: 

"In  spite  of  pressing  engagements  I  contrived  to  see  a 
good  deal  of  English  life,  at  home  and  outside,  in  the 
spheres  of  politics,  literature,  science,  and  the  professions, 
as  well  as  of  philanthropy;  in  regard  to  the  domestic  rela- 
tions, and  as  contrasted  with  life  abroad,  much  of  what  I 
saw  was  disappointing,  but  there  was  much  of  it  that 
seemed  full  of  hope."  Behraniji  M.  Malabari,  by  G.  Gidu- 
mal,  p.  238. 

"The  life  in  a  decent  English  home  is  a  life  of  equality 
among  all  the  members.  This  means  openness  and  mutual 
confidence.  Wife  and  husband  are  one  at  home,  however 
different  their  creed,  political  or  religious.  They  love, 
trust,  serve  each  other  as  true  partners,  each  contributing 
his  or  her  share  to  the  common  stock  of  happiness.  The 
children  stand  in  the  same  position  with  the  parents  as  the 
latter  stand  to  each  other.  There  are  no  secrets,  and  there- 
fore no  suspicion  on  the  one  hand  or  reserve  on  the  other. 
Mother  and  daughter  live  more  like  sisters;  father  and  son 
more  like  two  brothers.  The  parent  is  as  slow  to  assert 
his  or  her  authority  as  the  child  is  to  abuse  his  or  her  free- 
dom. The  education  of  the  heart  begins  very  early,  almost 
while  the  child  is  in  arms.  Then  begins  the  physical  edu- 
cation, followed  after  an  interval  by  education  of  the 
mind.  And  how  natural  is  the  system  of  education!  how 
pleasant  the  mode  of  imparting  it!  It  never  wearies  or 
cramps  the  recipient."  Jlie  Indian  Eye  on  English  Life,  by 
B.  M.  Malabari,  p.  62. 

"His  Christianity  strikes  one  as  being  a  religion  mainly 
of  flesh,  bone  and  muscle.  It  teaches  him,  more  than  any- 
thing else,  how  to  live,  to  survive,  to  make  the  best  of  life. 
At  home,  or  abroad,  he  appears  a  good  deal  to  be  guided 
by    this    same    muscular    principle,  to    aggrandize,  to  con- 


368    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

quer,  and  to  rule.  His  life,  at  its  best,  is  a  high  fever  of 
humanity  from  which  the  divine  has  been  eliminated,  or  in 
which,  rather,  the  divine  has  not  yet  made  a  dwelling- 
place.  It  makes  one  wonder  at  such  times  if  the  life  and 
teachings  of  Christ —Britain's  most  precious  heritage — may 
not,  after  all,  be  thrown  away  upon  a  people  whose  spir- 
itual appreciation  is  so  defective.  Are  such  a  people  likely 
to  attain  to  anything  like  a  perfect  life,  making  for  peace 
and  righteousness?"  The  Indian  Eye  on  English  Life,  by  B. 
M.  Malabari,  p.  96. 

"On  the  other  hand,  one  need  not  be  a  Christian  him- 
self to  be  able  to  see  that  Christianity  has  tended  power- 
fully to  humanize  one  of  the  least  human  of  the  races  of 
man.  In  its  essence,  it  ought  to  exercise  a  three-fold 
influence — to  humanize,  to  liberalize,  to  equalize.  This,  to 
me,  is  a  very  great  achievement.  Other  religions  have 
their  special  merits;  but  none  of  them  claims  to  have  ren- 
dered this  three-fold  service  to  the  race."  The  Indian  Eye 
on  English  Life,  by  B.  M.  Malabari,  p.  99. 

Prof.  Welinkar,  of  Wilson  College,  Bombay,  has  grasped 
firmly  and  expressed  with  clearness  one  of  the  chief  differ- 
ences between  English  and  Hindu  education; 

"You  cannot  by  stuffing  the  student's  head  with  any 
amount  of  mere  book-knowledge,  get  him  to  imbibe  a  gen- 
uine love  for  the  fundamental  virtues  of  the  English  char- 
acter— its  love  of  truth,  its  magnanimity,  its  devotion  to 
righteousness.  You  must  get  at  the  spring  of  these 
traits,  discover  the  moral  motive  power  which  sustains  the 
best  and  noblest  in  the  life  of  England,  and  you  must 
make  the  youth  of  India  drink  of  that  life-giving  stream, 
and  thus  derive  the  moral  power  that  alone  can  urge  to 
such  lofty  action."  Liberal  Education  iit  India,  "H.  G.  We\- 
inkar,  p.  18. 

Note  5,  p.  82. 

"Un  fils  des  crois6s,  le  prince  de  Polignac,  m'6crivait 
rfecemment  au  sujet  de  I'lslam.  Cette  puissante  discipline 
des  ames  ne  compte  pas  un  seul  rebelle  parmi  ses  adeptes, 
c'est-a-dire  pas  un  athee.  .  .  .  Un  pareil  resultat  ne 
peut  s'obtenir  sans  une  grandeur  intrins^que.     Et  il  ajou- 


NOTES.  369 

tait  de  vive  voix  ces  paroles  hardies,  auxquelles  je  m'as- 
socie:  Les  Arabes  sont  plus  Chretiens  que  nous  et  c'est  par 
la  porta  de  I'lslam  que  nous  reviendrons  a  I'Evangile. 
Nous  avons  besoin  maintenant  de  cet  intermediaire  entre 
Jesus  et  nous."  Christianisme  et  Islamisme.  Conferences 
donnhs  a  Paris  dans  le  mois  de  Mai,  i8g^,  par  M.  Hyacinthe 
Loyson,  p.  66. 

Note  6,  p.  85. 

On  that  hard  Pagan  world  disgust 

And  secret  loathing  fell; 
Deep  weariness  and  sated  lust 

Made  human  life  a  hell. 

The  brooding  East  with  awe  beheld 

Her  impious  younger  world; 
The  Roman  tempest  swell'd  and  swell'd 

And  on  her  head  was  hurl'd. 

The  East  bow'd  low  before  the  blast 

In  patient,  deep  disdain; 
She  let  the  legions  thunder  past, 

And  plunged  in  thought  again. 

So  well  she  mused,  a  morning  broke 

Across  her  spirit  gray; 
A  conquering,  new-born  joy  awoke, 

And  filled  her  life  with  day. 

—  Obermann   Once  More,  by  Matthew  Arnold. 

Note  7,  p.  88. 

"We  know  how  the  first  fellowship  of  the  brethren  met; 
how  they  went  forth  with  words  of  mercy,  love,  justice, 
and  hope;  we  know  their  self-denial,  humility,  and  zeal; 
their  heroic  lives  and  awful  deaths;  their  loving  natures 
and  their  noble  purposes;  how  they  gathered  around  them 
wherever  they  came  the  purest  and  greatest;  how  across 
mountains,  seas,  and  continents  the  communion  of  saints 
joined  in  affectionate  trust;  how  from  the  deepest  corrup- 
tion of  the  heart  arose  a  yearning  for  a  truer  life;  how  the 
new  faith,  ennobling  the  instincts  of  human  nature,  raised 


37°    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

up  the  slave,  the  poor,  and  the  humble  to  the  dignity  of 
common  manhood,  and  gave  new  meaning  to  the  true 
nature  of  womanhood;  how,  by  slow  degrees,  the  church, 
with  its  rule  of  right,  of  morality,  and  of  communion, 
arose;  how  the  first  founders  and  apostles  of  this  faith 
lived  and  died,  and  all  their  gifts  were  concentrated  in 
one,  of  all  the  characters  of  certain  history,  doubtless  the 
loftiest  and  purest — the  unselfish,  the  great-hearted  Paul." 
The  Meaning  of  History,  Frederic  Harrison,  pp.  60-1. 

Note  8,  p.  92. 

"There  are  moments  in  which  we  are  all  Buddhists; 
when  life  has  disappointed  us,  when  weariness  is  upon  us, 
when  the  keen  anguish  born  of  the  sight  of  human  suffer- 
ing appals  and  benumbs  us;  when  we  are  frozen  to  terror, 
and  our  manhood  flies  at  the  sight  of  the  Medusa-like  head 
of  the  world's  unappeased  and  unappeasable  agony;  then 
we  too  are  torn  by  the  paroxysm  of  anguish;  we  would 
flee  to  the  Nirvana  of  oblivion  and  unconsciousness,  turn- 
ing our  backs  upon  what  we  cannot  alleviate,  and  longing 
to  lay  down  the  burden  of  life,  and  to  escape  from  that 
which  has  become  insupportable."  Ellinwood' s  Oriental  Re- 
ligions and  Christianity,  p.  324. 

But  this  is  only  a  temporary  mood,  as  Dr.  Ellinwood  has 
clearly  shown,  and  it  is  essentially  an  unchristian  spirit. 
Some  of  the  distinctions  between  Christianity  and  Buddh- 
ism have  been  clearly  set  forth  by  Prof.  George  H.  Palmer, 
of  Harvard  University,  reported  in  The  Outlook,  July,  1897, 
pp.  443-450. 

"Only  when  desire  has  altogether  passed  away  can  mis- 
ery cease.  Is  this  pessimism?  I  certainly  do  not  like  to  use 
that  obnoxious  word  in  the  presence  of  my  gentle  friend  (Mr. 
H.  Dharmapala).  Yet  as  we  reflect  how  Christianity  faces  this 
same  tremendous  problem,  there  appears  a  notable  con- 
trast in  emphasis.  Christianity  knows  of  death,  knows  of 
old  age,  knows  of  disease,  and  is  cheerful  before  them; 
looks  upon  them  indeed  as  the  very  means  which  may 
assist  us  in  that  for  which  we  are  here.  These  are  valuable 
forces,  it  tells  us;  for  in  this  world  we  are  co-workers  with 
God,  intrusted  with  the  charge  of  our  own  upbuilding,  and 


NOTES.  371 

through  these  very  agencies  that  upbuilding  may  be  accom- 
plished." 

"Horror  of  individual  destruction  is  a  distinctive  note 
in  Christianity.  Each  one  through  consciousness  is  given 
charge  of  himself;  he  is  to  build  himself  up  into  steadfast 
character,  into  powerful  personality.  On  this  Jesus  per- 
petually dwells. 

"I  find  in  the  teachings  of  Buddha  little  provision  for 
the  great  organic  institutions  of  society.  The  family  do;s 
not  naturally  spring  from  such  a  soil.  Of  course  the  fam- 
ily exists  under  Buddhism.  It  is  tolerated.  But,  after  all, 
the  call  of  the  Buddha  is  always  to  a  monastic  life,  and 
the  thoroughgoing  Buddhist  is  a  monk.  Monkery  is  deeply 
planted  in  the  nature  of  Buddhism.  The  family,  if  it 
exists,  exists  by  force  of  nature,  a  subordinated  institution. 
Woman  as  woman  has  no  well-grounded  dignity.  Nor  do 
I  see  any  provision  in  Buddhism  for  the  upbuilding  of  a 
state.  The  organic  union  of  man  with  man  in  spiritual 
bonds  is  something  on  which  Buddhism  depends,  but 
which  it  does  not  expressly  sanction."  Christianity  and 
Buddhism,  Prof.  George  H.  Palmer. 

Writing  of  Buddhism  in  China,  the  Hon.  G.  N.  Curzon 
says: 

"The  Buddhist  priests  are  no  amateurs  in  the  art  of 
mendicancy.  Sometimes  large  bands  of  them  may  be  seen 
patroling  the  streets,  and  by  the  discordant  clamor  of  a 
gong  calling  attention  to  the  unmistakable  character  of  the 
errand  which  has  brought  them  down  into  the  thorough- 
fares of  men.  By  these  different  methods  they  manage  to 
scrape  along;  their  buildings  and  temples  just  saved  from 
dilapidation;  their  persons  and  costumes  in  the  last  stage 
of  seediness  and  decay;  their  piety  an  illusion,  their  pre- 
tensions a  fraud;  themselves  at  once  the  saviours  and  the 
outcasts  of  society,  its  courted  and  despised."  Problems  of 
the  Far  East,  Geo.  N.  Curzon,  M.P.,  p.  352. 

"The  expression  of  their  features  is  usually  one  of  blank 
and  idiotic  absorption;  which  is,  perhaps,  not  surprising, 
considering  that  of  the  words  which  they  intone  scarcely 
one  syllable  do  they  themselves  understand.  The  mass- 
book  is  a  dead  letter  to  them,  for  it  is   written  in  Sanskrit 


372   cHRiSTiANirr,  the  world-religion. 

or  Pali,  which  they  can  no  more  decipher  than  fly.  The 
words  that  they  chant  are  merely  the  equivalent  in  sound 
of  the  ordinary  sentences,  rendered  into  Chinese  charac- 
ters, and  are  therefore  totally  devoid  of  sense."  Problems 
of  the  Far  East,  Geo.  N.  Curzon,  M.P.,  p.  355. 

Note  9,  p.  103. 

"The  Hindu  religion  is  a  reflection  of  the  composite 
character  of  the  Hindus,  who  are  not  one  people  but  many. 
It  is  based  on  the  idea  of  universal  receptivity.  It  has  ever 
aimed  at  accommodating  itself  to  circumstances,  and  has 
carried  on  the  process  of  adaptation  through  more  than 
three  thousand  years.  It  has  first  borne  with,  and  then,  so 
to  speak,  swallowed,  digested,  and  assimilated,  something 
from  all  creeds.  Or,  like  a  vast  hospitable  mansion,  it 
has  opened  its  doors  to  all  comers;  it  has  not  refused  a 
welcome  to  applicants  of  every  grade  from  the  highest  to 
the  lowest,  if  only  willing  to  adopt  caste-rules;  insomuch 
that  many  regard  Hinduism  as  a  system  of  social  rules 
rather  than  of  religious  creeds."  Brahmanism  and  Hindu- 
ism, Sir  Monier  Williams,  p.  57. 

Note  10,  p.  103. 

"Why  does  the  Englishman  appear  two  different  beings 
— in  England  all  kindness.  In  India  all  hauteur?  Will  the 
following  suggestions  throw  some  light  on  this  very  seri- 
ous question?  When  the  Englishman  met  the  Hindu  in 
England  he  never  realized  the  depth  of  the  gulf  that  sep- 
arates the  races  from  each  other — the  immensity  of  the 
difference  in  their  ideas  and  habits.  He  comes  to  India, 
and  the  truth  begins  to  dawn  upon  him.  Idolatry  every- 
where; caste  everywhere;  women  immured  in  the  zenana. 
If  he  be  a  religious  man  these  things  deeply  pain  him;  if 
he  be  only  intellectually  a  Christian,  the  sorrow  speedily 
turns  into  contempt — contempt  not  of  the  people,  but  of 
their  superstitions.  He  asks  why  things  so  ruinous  are 
allowed  to  endure.  He  gets  no  answer,  but  is  told  that, 
in  addition  to  the  polytheism  all  around,  there  exists  a 
high  philosophy  such  as  is  unfolded  in  the  Upanishads  or 
Vedanta.     Waiving   the   question   of   the   intrinsic   merit  of 


NOTES.  373 

such  philosophy,  he  asks  what  is  its  practical  value?  What 
is  it  doing  to  raise  India  from  groveling  superstition?  The 
answer  is  'Nothing';  true  or  false,  it  is  a  mere  speculation. 
He  is  a  practical  man,  earnest  about  reform;  and  from  this 
boastful,  barren  philosophy  he  turns  away  in  disgust,  or, 
at  any  rate,  despair."  A  Letter  to  Indian  Friends^  by  Rev. 
J.  Murray  Mitchell,  p.  7. 

Note   ii,  p.  104. 

"Ye  are  also  forbidden  to  take  to  wife  free  women  who 
are  married,  except  those  women  whom  your  right  hands 
shall  possess  as  slaves.  This  is  ordained  you  from  God. 
Whatever  is  beside  this  is  allowed  you ;  that  ye  may  with 
your  substance  provide  wives  for  yourselves,  acting  that 
which  is  right  and  avoiding  whoredom.  And  for  the  advan- 
tage which  ye  receive  from  them,  give  them  their  reward, 
according  to  that  which  is  ordained;  but  it  shall  be 
no  crime  in  you  to  make  any  other  agreement  among  your- 
selves, after  the  ordinance  shall  be  complied  with;  for  God 
is  knowing  and  wise.  Whoso  among  you  hath  not  means 
sufficient  that  he  may  marry  free  women  who  are  believ- 
ers, let  him  marry  with  such  of  your  maid-servants  whom 
your  right  hand  possesses  as  are  true  believers;  for  God 
well  knoweth  your  faith."      The  Koran,  Chap.  IV. 

Note  12,  p.  106. 

"The  lowest  of  all  is  the  Pariah  outcast,  hiding  him- 
self from  public  gaze,  a  thing  conscious  of  hopeless  degra- 
dation, shunning  himself,  so  to  say,  as  much  as  he  is 
shunned  by  others.  O  Caste,  thou  inexorable  tyrant,  what 
hope  is  there  in  India  while  thy  Jugernaut  wheel  is  grind- 
ing man's  best  nature  out  of  him !  Ye  missionaries  of 
Christ,  why  don't  you  save  these  unhappy  tribes  from  per- 
haps eternal  wrong?  What  a  rich  harvest  of  souls  to  save  !" 
Gujarat  and  the  Gujaratis,  by  B.  M.  Malabari,   p.  186. 


LECTURE    in. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    FOR    THIRD    LECTURE. 

On  the  general  doctrine  of  God  in  religion,  see: 

d'Alviella  Hibbert  Lectures,  1891,  Origin  and  Growth  of 

the  Coueption  of  God. 
James  Freeman  Clarke,   Te7i  Great  Religions,  Vol.  II. 
C.  Loring  Brace,   The  Unknotvn  God. 

On  non-Christian  Monotheism,  see: 

S.  H.  Kellogg,  Genesis  and  Growth  of  Religion,  Lectures 

7  and  8. 
Ellin  wood.  Oriental  Religions  and  Christianity,  Lecture  7. 

For  the  Varuna  literature,  see: 

Monier  Williams,  Indian   Wisdom,  p.  13. 
Muir,  Sanskrit  Texts. 

For  the  Old  Testament  Doctrine  of  God,  see: 
Schultz,  Old  Testament  Theology,  Vol.  II. 

For  Hindu  Pantheism,  see: 

Jacob,     A     Manual    of    Hindu     Pantheism,     Tubner's 
Oriental  Series,  1891. 

C.  R.  Lanman,   The  Beginnings  of  Hindu  Pantheism. 

On  the  general  subject  of  theism,  see: 
Flint,   Theism. 
The  same,  Anti-Theistic  Theories. 

A.  C.  Fraser,  Philosophy  of  Theism. 

On  the  special  doctrines  of  the  incarnation  and  redemption, 
see: 

Canon  Gore,  Lectures  on  the  Incarnation  of  the  Son  of  God. 

D.  W.  Simon,   The  Redemption  of  Man. 
Fairbairn,   The  Place  of  Christ  in  Modern  Theology. 

B.  F.  Westcolt,    The  Incarnation  and  Common  Life. 

374 


NOTES.  375 

Note   i,  p.  ii6. 

"One  to  whom  the  boundary  line  between  the  Creator 
and  His  world  is  perfectly  clear,  one  who  knows  the  eternal 
difference  between  mind  and  matter,  one  born  amid  the 
trumphs  of  science,  can  but  faintly  realize  the  mental  con- 
dition of  the  millions  of  Japan  to  whom  there  is  no  unify- 
ing thought  of  the  Creator-Father."  The  Religions  of  Japan, 
Griffis,  p.  14. 

Note  2,  p.  117. 

Dr.  Fairbairn  contends  that  Christ  is  the  creator  of 
monotheism  in  the  strict  and  proper  sense  of  the  term. 
■'Certain  of  the  prophets  of  Israel  had  been  monotheists, 
but  Judaism  was  not  a  monotheism,  for  a  religion  that  is 
so  bound  up  with  a  tribe  and  its  polity  as  to  be  incapable 
of  universal  realization,  does  not  really  know  God  as  abso- 
lutely supreme."  He  affirms  that  monotheism  in  the  strict 
sense  means  "that  alike  in  idea  and  reality  God  is  the  God 
of  all  men,  open  and  accessible  to  all." 

"We  may  say,  then,  that,  so  far  as  realized  religions 
were  concerned,  we  had  before  Christ  polytheisms,  pan- 
theisms, henotheisms,  but  no  monotheism.  By  one  and 
the  same  act  He  created  the  conception  of  one  God,  one 
religion,  and  one  society;  but  the  first  would  have  been 
inefficient  and  incomplete  if  it  had  not  been  explicated  in 
the  second  and  incorporated  in  the  third.  The  religion 
explicated  the  God,  for  it  was  ethical  in  nature  as  He  was 
in  character;  the  society  incorporated  His  ideal,  for  it  was 
universal,  as  God  was  one,  and  filial,  as  He  was  father." 
The  Place  of  Christ  in  Modern  Theology,   Fairbairn,   p.    515. 

In  speaking  of  monotheism  as  primeval  I  intend  merely 
to  convey  the  idea  of  its  antiquity.  It  appears  in  early 
sacred  literatures,  but  back  of  these  there  was  probably  a 
long  evolution.  The  following  is  Jevons's  account  of  the 
development  of  the  monotheistic  idea: 

"The  first  step  toward  monotheism  is  taken  when  one 
deity  is,  as  not  unusually  happens,  conceived  to  be  supreme 
over  all  the  others,  and  the  rest  are  but  his  vassals,  his 
ministers  or  angels.  This  is  due  to  the  transference  of  the 
relations  which   obtain  in  human  society  to  the  community 


376    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

of  the  gods;  they,  like  men,  are  supposed  to  have  a  king 
over  them.  The  next  step  is  the  result  of  the  constant 
tendency  of  the  ancients  to  identify  one  god  with  another: 
Herodotus  had  no  difficulty  in  recognizing  the  gods  of 
Greece  under  the  names  which  the  Egyptians  gave  to  their 
own  deities;  Csesar  and  Tacitus  did  not  hesitate  to  identify 
the  gods  of  Gaul  and  Germany  with  those  of  Rome.  And 
this  was  the  more  easy  and  reasonable  because  in  many 
cases  the  gods  in  question  were  really  the  deifications  of 
some  one  and  the  same  natural  phenomenon — sun,  moon, 
etc."  Introduction  to  the  History  of  Religion,  F.  B.  Jevons, 
P-  383- 

Note  3,  p.  125. 

"Historical  pantheism,  the  typical,  fascinating  panthe- 
ism of  Spinoza,  is  in  error  only  through  its  exclusiveness. 
The  conception  of  one  universal  substance  is  true  as  far  as 
it  goes,  but  it  is  not  the  whole  truth.  The  strand  of  differ- 
ence runs  throughout  creation.  As  without  the  identity 
there  can  be  no  unity,  so  without  the  difference  there  can 
be  no  variety  and  no  reality  in  finite  existences."  The 
Christ  of  To-day,  Gordon,  p.  95. 

Note  4,  p.  136. 

An  interesting  and  instructive  parallel  has  been  drawn 
by  Dr.  K.  S.  Macdonald  between  the  Aryan  god  "Agni" 
and  the  God  of  Christian  revelation. 

"The  descriptions  given  in  the  Vedas  of  the  god  Agni 
lend  themselves  wonderfully  to  a  comparison  with  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ  alike  as  God  and  man,  as  prophet,  priest,  and 
king.  We  do  not  think  that  our  so  using  them  is  unjusti- 
fiable or  in  any  way  dishonoring  to  Christ  or  injurious  to 
the  interests  of  His  cause.  On  the  other  hand,  such  com- 
parisons, if  wisely  made,  ought  to  lead  people  who  profess 
to  have  respect  for  the  Vedas  to  a  greater  appreciation  of 
the  features  or  traits  which  are  common  to  both."  Agni, 
the  Aryan  God,  a  Parallel,  by  K.  S.  Macdonald,  M.A.,  D.D., 
reprinted  from  The  Indian  Evangelical  Review,  January  and 
April,  1897,  p.  20. 


NOTES.  Z11 

"We  doubt  whether  out  of  all  the  ideals  set  before  us 
among  the  so-called  three  hundred  and  thirty  millions  of 
Hindu  gods,  there  can  be  selected  any  whose  character  is 
more  satisfactory  to  Brahmos,  Christians,  or  Mohammed- 
ans, or  indeed  to  nineteenth  century  ideas  generally,  than 
the  character  which  the  ancient  Aryans  of  India  gave  to 
Agni — a  character  largely  preserved  among  Hindus  to  the 
present  day  in  their  daily  worship  among  all  the  vicissi- 
tudes and  changes  which  Hindus  underwent  during  the  last 
three  thousand  years^-the  more  remarkable  as  he  is  but 
seldom  worshiped  by  or  through  a  man-made  image,  as 
almost  all  the  other  gods  are."     Ibid,  p.  6. 

"We  have  also  removed  a  great  deal  of  rubbish  which, 
not  only  lay  in  heaps  all  round  about  the  structure,  but  was 
piled  up  in  the  very  rooms  inside,  and  up  on  the  walls, 
inside  and  outside,  disfiguring  stone  and  brick.  All  this 
we  have  carted  away,  and  exposed  to  view  the  individual 
stones  and  bricks,  some  of  which  are  beautiful  to  behold  in 
their  naked,  unadorned  simplicity.  But  after  all  what  does 
it  all  amount  to?  Nothing  more  than  the  foundations  of 
what  promised  to  be  a  noble  superstructure;  but  which, 
instead  of  being  finished  according  to  the  original  plan, 
was  turned  to  ignoble  and  impure  purposes,  altogether  dis- 
honoring to  the  Great  Architect.  In  Christianity  alone 
does  the  original  plan  find  its  fulfillment."  Ibid,  p.  21. 

As  an  illustration  of  the  Hindu  habit  of  deifying  every 
fact  and  force,  the  following  is  of  interest: 

"Soma  itself  becomes  a  god,  and  a  very  mighty  one;  he 
is  even  the  creator  and  father  of  the  gods;  the  king  of  gods 
and  men;  all  creatures  are  in  his  hand.  It  is  surely  extra- 
ordinary that  the  Aryas  could  apply  such  hyperbolical  laud- 
ations to  the  liquor  which  they  had  made  to  trickle  into 
the  vat,  and  which  they  knew  to  be  the  juice  of  a  plant 
they  had  cut  down  on  the  mountains  and  pounded  in  a 
mortar;  and  that  intoxication  should  be  confounded  with 
inspiration.  Yet  of  such  aberrations  we  know  the  human 
mind  is  perfectly  capable."  The  Non-Christian  Religions  of 
the  World — The  Hindu  Religion,  J.   Murray    Mitchell,  p.  10. 


378    CHRISTIANITY,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 
Note  5,  p.  140. 

"The  idea  of  sacrifice  is  inherent  in  human  nature,  and 
ought  to  have  been  retained,  cherished,  purified,  and 
realized:  though,  when  the  conception  of  deity  becomes 
impersonal,  as  it  does  in  the  Upanishads,  there  is  no 
Supreme  Being  to  whom  sacrifices,  even  of  the  heart  and 
life,  can  be  offered.  That  the  idea  was  true  and  necessary, 
is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  sacrificial  system — suppressed 
during  the  period  of  the  Upanishads — broke  out  again 
afterwards  in  still  greater  and  more  manifold  activity  in 
the  popular  sectarian  cults  of  Vaishnavites  and  Saivites ; 
and  material  sacrifices,  offered  to  these  and  to  other  deities, 
have  continued,  in  one  form  or  another,  down  to  the  pres- 
ent day,  and  must  continue,  in  this  and  other  non-Chris- 
tian lands,  till  Christ,  the  great  Fulfiller  of  Sacrifices,  is 
understood."     Studies  in  The  ^^rtwzV/irt^.f,  T.  E.  Slater,  p.  13. 

Note  6,  p.  141. 

"Brahmanism,  again,  knows  evil,  but  as  metaphysical, 
rather  than  moral,  man's  being  in  a  system  of  illusion, 
divided  by  ignorance  from  his  rest  in  the  Brahma  who  is 
the  only  universal  reality.  Buddhism,  which  has  of  all 
religions  the  most  overmastering  sense  of  misery,  has  also 
the  least  sense  of  sin."  The  Place  of  Christ  in  Modern  The- 
ology, Fairbairn,  p.  454. 

"The  suffering  and  hardened  and  indifferent  world  waits 
for  a  broken  heart  in  the  presence  of  the  eternal  pity  in 
Christ.  The  primary  want  is  the  dissolving  of  the  soul  in 
the  sea  of  regret  and  grief  over  the  beauty  of  the  Lord  made 
real  in  the  Master.  The  moral  idea  will  never  rise  upon 
these  multitudes  until  it  rises  out  of  this  sea  of  penitential 
feeling,  like  the  sun  out  of  a  troubled  ocean.  Nothing  but 
the  fires  of  such  sorrow  and  love  can  melt  the  chains  of 
evil  habit,  consume  the  force  of  earthly  inclinations,  and 
burn  up  utterly  the  vast  psychic  accumulation  of  a  soul 
alienated  from  the  true  order  and  divine  law  of  its  life. 
Passion  led  astray,  and  passion  must  recover  to  righteous- 
ness. Only  the  fury  of  love  can  avail  for  those  within  the 
prison  of  moral  despair."  The  Christ  of  To-day,  Gordon, 
p.  278. 


NOTES.  379 

Note  7,  p.  143. 

"Even  when,  over-constrained  by  the  testimony  of  con- 
science, the  Hindu  will  speak  as  if  moral  good  and  evil 
were  to  be  rewarded  and  punished  by  a  personal  God,  still 
that  doctrine  of  Karma  remains,  and  is  no  less  fatal  to  the 
idea  of  responsibility.  For  if  I  am  not  free;  if  all  my 
actions  are  determined  by  a  law  of  physical  necessity 
entirely  beyond  my  control, — then  assuredly  I  am  not 
responsible  for  them.  Let  it  be  observed  again  that  these 
are  not  merely  logical  consequences  attached  to  the  system 
by  an  antagonist  which  the  people  will  refuse  to  admit. 
The  Hindus  themselves,  both  in  their  authoritative  books 
and  in  their  common  talk,  argue  that  very  conclusion.  In 
the  Puranas  again  and  again  those  guilty  of  the  most  flagi- 
tious crimes  are  comforted  by  Krishna,  for  example,  on  this 
express  ground,  that  whereas  all  was  fixed  by  their  Karma, 
and  man  therefore  has  no  power  over  that  which  is  to  be, 
therefore  in  the  crime  they  were  guilty  of  no  fault.  And 
so  among  the  people  one  wearies  of  hearing  the  constant 
excuse  for  almost  everything  which  ought  not  to  be,  'What 
can  we  do?  It  was  our  Karma!  '  "  Dr.  Kellogg,  quoted  in 
Selections  from  the  Upanishads,  pp.  93-4. 

Note  8,  p.  149. 

"The  Christian  doctrine  imputes  punishable  guilt  only 
so  far  as  each  one's  free  choice  makes  the  sin  his  own ;  the 
dying  infant  who  has  no  choice  is  saved  by  grace ;  but  upon 
every  Buddhist,  however  short-lived,  there  rests  an  heir- 
loom of  destiny  which  countless  transmigrations  cannot 
discharge."  Ellinwood's  Oriental  Religions  and  Christianity, 
p.  328. 

Note  9,  p.  149. 

"A  state  in  which  the  knowing  and  the  known  are  one, 
in  which  subject  and  object  are  identified,  implies,  as  Sir 
William  Hamilton,  Mansel,  and  Herbert  Spencer  have 
alike  shown,  the  annihilation  of  both;  and  hence  our  very 
personality,  the  existence  of  which  is  to  each  person  a  fact 
beyond  all  others  the  most  certain,  is  yet  a  thing  which 
truly  cannot   be   known   at  all;  for  the  object  perceived  is 


380    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

itself  the  perceiving   object."     Studies  hi  the   Upanishad,  T . 
E.  Slater,  p.  22. 

"This  kind  of  pantheism,  however,  reaches  the  unity  of 
the  finite  with  the  infinite  solely  by  denying  the  reality  of 
the  former.  It  reconciles  man  with  God  simply  by  the 
negation  of  all  that  makes  him  man.  But  such  a  nega- 
tive deliverance  is,  as  we  have  already  seen,  no  real  eman- 
cipation. If  it  brings  rest  to  the  weary,  it  is  but  the  rest  of 
the  grave.  Nay,  as  the  Buddhist  recognizes,  with  the 
absolute  negation  of  the  finite,  the  infinite,  also,  which  is 
known  only  in  its  relation  to  it,  is  deprived  of  all  meaning. 
Its  God  ceases  to  be  a  living  God,  just  because  He  has 
absorbed  all  life  unto  Himself."  The  Evolution  of  Religion, 
Edward  Caird,  Vol.  II,  p.  149. 

Note  10,  p.  152. 

See  Pressense's  Ancient  World  and  Christianity,  p.  469. 
The  expectant  attitude  of  the  pagan  world  at  the  coming 
of  Christ  is  well  described  in  Chapter  II  of  Book  V.  In 
regard  to  Virgil's  prophecies  in  the  fourth  Eclogue  of  a  gol- 
den age  to  come  when  the  earth  shall  be  delivered  from 
sorrow,  Pressense  says: 

"It  was  especially  in  this  aspect  that  Virgil  was  the 
inspired  voice  of  his  generation.  Victor  Hugo  has  well 
expressed  in  the  following  lines  the  mysterious  expectancy 
which  filled  the  air  at  this  period: 

"  'Le  vers  porte  a  sa  eime  une  lueur  etrange 
C'est  qu'a  son  insu  meme  il  est  une  des  ames 
Que  rOrient  lointain  teignait  de  vagues  flammes, 
C'est  qu'il  est  un  des  coeurs  que  deja,  sous  les  cieux 
Dorait  le  jour  naissant  du  Christ  mysterieux.'  " 

"It  is  easy  to  understand  how  Virgil  came  to  be  Chris- 
tianized in  early  legend.  His  feast  was  kept  in  the  Middle 
Ages  as  one  of  the  prophets  of  Christ.  St.  Paul  was  sup- 
posed to  have  visited  his  tomb  in  Naples,  and  to  have 
lamented  over  it  thus:  'Oh  greatest  of  poets,  what  had  I 
not  made  of  thee,  had  I  but  met  thee  in  thy  lifetime?' 

"We  conclude  with  M.  Boissier  that  Virgil  was  one  of 
those  who  prepared  the   way    for   the  triumph  of  Christian- 


NOTES.  381 

ity  without  knowing  it,  and  with  M.  Duruy  we  say,  that 
like  a  new  Columbus  he  pointed,  through  the  mists  of  the 
West,  to  the  new  world  which  was  to  come  forth  from  them. 
Dante  gave  a  perfectly  true  picture  of  Virgil  when  he 
likened  him  to  a  man  going  out  into  the  night  and  carry- 
ing behind  him  a  torch  of  which  he  makes  no  use,  but 
which  lightens  the    path  of  those  who  come  after. 

"Every  impartial  historian  recognizes  from  his  own  point 
of  view  the  attitude  of  expectancy  in  which  souls  were 
standing  at  this  time.  'Every  man,'  says  Lucretius,  'is 
groping  after  the  way  of  life.'  It  seems  strange  to  find 
this  great  Epicurean  poet  thus  anticipating  the  words  after- 
ward spoken  by  Paul  at  Athens."  The  Ancient  World  and 
Christianity,  E.  De  Pressens6,  D.  D.,  pp.  558-559. 


LECTURE  IV. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY  FOR  THE  FOURTH  LECTURE. 

On  the  general  subject  of  the  Bible  and  Biblical  study,  see: 
Moulton,   The  Literary  Study  of  the  Bible. 
C.  A.  Briggs,  Biblical  Study. 

Bartlett  and  Peters,  Scriptures,  Hebrew  and  Christian. 
Ladd,    What  is  the  Bible? 
Gladden,    Who  Wrote  the  Bible ? 
Zenos,   The  Elements  of  the  Higher  Criticism. 
Lias,  Principles  of  Biblical  Criticism. 
Westcott,    The  History  of  the  English  Bible. 

On  the  other  sacred  books  of  the  world,  see: 

The  Book  of  the  Dead.     Translation  by  Renouf. 

For  the  Akkadian  Hymns,  see  translations  (to  be  used  with 
great  caution)  in  Sayce,  Hibbert  Lectures  on  the  Religion  of 
the  Ancient  Babylonians. 

For  the  Avesta,  see  translation  in  the  Sacred  Books  of  the 
East{S.  B.  E.)Mo\s.  IV,  XXIII  and  XXXI,  and  the  revolu- 
tionary work  on  the  Avesta,  by  the  late  Professor  Darm- 
steter. 

For  the  Kojiki,  see  Chamberlain's  translation  in  Proceedings 
of  the  Asiatic  Society  of  Japan;    supplement  to  Volume  X. 

For  the  sacred  books  of  China,  see  the  translations  in 
S.  B.  E.,  Vols.  Ill,  XVI,  XXVII  and  XXVIII  (Confucian) 
and  XXXIX  and  XL  (Taoism). 

For  the  Vedas,  see  translations  of  the   Pig  and  Atharva  by 
R.  T.    H.   Griffith.     Portions  of  the  Rig  Veda   have  been 
translated  in  S.  B.  E.,  Vols.  XXXII  and  XLVIII,  and  the 
Atharva  Veda  in  a  volume  of  S.  B.  E.  just  issued. 
382 


NOTES.  383 

For  the    Brahmanas,   see   the  translation  of    the    Satapatha 

Brakmana,  S.  B.  E.,  XII,  XXVI,  XLI. 
For  the  Puranas,  see   the  translation  of  the  Vishnu  Purana 

by  Wilson,  and  of  the  Bhagavata  Purana  by  Burnouf. 
For  the  Upanishads,  see   the   translation  in  S.  B.  E.,  Vols.  I 

and  XV. 

T.  E.  Slater,  Studies  in  the  Upanishads. 

For  the  Buddhist  texts,  see  translations  in  S.  B.  E. — (i) 
Vinaya,  Vols.  XIII,  XVII,  XX;  (2)  Dhavtmapada,  Vol.  X; 
(3)  Selected  Suttas,  Vol.  XI. 

For  the  Koran,  see  the  well-known  translation  by  Sale,  the 
commentary  by  Wherry,  four  volumes,  and  the  transla- 
tion by  Palmer,  in  S.  B.  E.,  VI  and  XIX. 

For  the  Sikh  Bible,  see  the  translation  by  E.  Trumpp,  called 
The  Adi-Granth;  or.  The  Holy  Scriptures  of  the  Sikhs,  1877. 

Note  i,  p.  179. 

For  instructive  examples  of  the  noble  elements  which  are 
found  in  non-Christian  literature,  read  the  collection  of 
prayers,  Egyptian,  Akkadian,  Babylonian,  Vedic,  Avestic, 
Chinese,  Mohammedan,  and  Modern  Hindu  which  Prof. 
Max  Miiller  has  brought  together  in  his  volume  of  Gifford 
Lectures,  1892,  Theosophy  or  Psychological  Religion,  pp.  13-22. 

See  also  Hymn  xcvii.  Rig   Veda,   Book  I: 

1.  Chasing  with    light  our  sin  away,  O  Agni,  shine  thou 

wealth  on  us. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

2.  For   goodly   fields,  for  pleasant  homes,  for  wealth,  we 

sacrifice  to  thee. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

3.  Best  praiser  of  all  these  be  he;  foremost  of  our  chiefs 

who  sacrifice. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

4.  So   that   thy    worshipers    and    we,   thine,    Agni,    in   our 

sons  may  live. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

5.  As  ever-conquering   Agni's   beams   of    splendor  go   to 

every  side. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 


384    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

6.  To  every  side   thy    face  is    turned,  thou   art   triumphant 

everywhere. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

7.  O  thou  whose  face  looks  every  way,  bear  off  our  foes  as 

in  a  ship. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

8.  As    in   a  ship,  convey   us   for  our  advantage  o'er  the 

flood. 
May  his  light  chase  our  sin  away. 

Note  2,  p.  182. 

"How  has  it  come  to  pass  that  the  fates  of  the  Upani- 
shads  and  of  the  Bible,  their  influence  on  the  world,  have 
been  so  different?  How  different  their  nature  and  their 
scope.  The  Bible  covers  the  course  of  the  world  from  the 
creation  to  the  final  restitution  of  all  things;  it  is  imbed- 
ded in,  and  asscoiated  with,  the  past  history  of  the  race;  it 
deals  with  all  the  problems  of  practical  life;  it  is  addressed 
to  all  men,  and  concerns  all  men — the  Book  for  the  millions. 

"If  the  ancient  Indian  ideal  of  spirituality  was  so  lofty, 
why  was  it  not  retained;  and  why  did  it  not  save  the 
country  from  degenerating?  If  but  one  human  being  had 
really  become  God  here  on  earth,  this  planet  of  ours  ought 
long  ago  to  have  been  transformed  into  a  very  different 
world.  But,  instead  of  that,  why  has  India  become  the 
most  illiterate  land;  and  the  land  that,  according  to  the 
late  Sir  Madhava  Rao,  has  suffered  more  from  self-created 
social  evils  than  any  other  community?  Is  the  present  state 
of  Hindu  society  and  the  present  moral  exhaustion  the 
legitimate  development  or  the  accidental  outcome  of  the 
ancient  philosophy  of  the  universe?  Pantheistic  thought 
has  always  exercised  a  paralyzing  influence  on  all  moral 
and  human  life.  Most  vital  is  the  connection  between  the 
highest  religious  thought  and  the  moral  and  social  life  of  a 
people.  And  what  have  all  the  philosophies  and  sciences 
of  the  world  done  for  the  regeneration  and  progress  of 
mankind  compared  with  the  one  truth — 'God  is  love?'  " 
Studies  in  the  Upanishads,  T.  E.  Slater,  p.  73. 

"Institutions  not  only  grow  but  decay  also,  and  decay  as 
well   as   growth    is   a   process  of   evolution.     Florid   art  is 


NOTES.  3^5 

evolved  out  of  something  simpler,  but  it  is  not  therefore 
superior  to  it.  The  Roman  Empire  was  evolved  out  of  the  -y^ 
Roman  Republic,  and  was  morally  a  degeneration  from  it. 
The  polytheism  of  Virgil  is  not  better,  as  religion,  than 
that  of  Homer;  the  polytheism  of  the  late  Brahmanism  is 
certainly  worse  than  that  of  the  earlier  periods.  There- 
fore to  say  that  the  only  evolution  in  religion — except 
that  which  is  on  the  lines  of  the  Bible — is  an  evolu- 
tion of  error,  may  be  quite  true  and  yet  not  show  that  the 
idea  of  evolution  is  applicable  to  heathen  religions.  Their 
evolution  may  well  have  been,  from  the  religious  point  of 
view,  one  long  process  of  degeneration.  Progress  is  cer- 
tainly as  exceptional  in  religion  as  in  other  things,  and 
where  it  takes  place  must  be  due  to  exceptional  causes." 
Introduction  to  the  History  of  Religion,  F.  B.  Jevons,  p.  5. 

Note  3,  p.  188. 

"But  no  other  history  and  no  human  experience  is  so 
clear  a  proof  of  the  practical  curse  to  a  people  which  lies  in 
a  false  philosophy  and  imperfect  religion  as  the  confused 
records  of  Hindu  thought  afford.  The  combination  of  pan- 
theism and  idolatry  seems  to  be  the  worst  possible  spiritual 
atmosphere  for  a  people.  The  belief  in  re-birth,  previous 
existence,  and  future  transmigration  became  almost 
stamped  congenitally  upon  the  Hindu  mind.  It  over- 
shadowed existence  from  the  earliest  moment  with  the 
deepest  darkness.  The  devout  and  thoughtful  worshiper 
saw  no  escape  from  it,  except  after  millions  of  aeons  in  the 
absolute  cessation  of  personal  existence  by  absorption  in 
God.  Pain  and  suffering  and  sin  were  the  necessary 
accompaniments  of  conscious  life  through  all  possible 
existences  till  the  soul  entered  into  the  Infinite  Spirit." 
The  Unknow7i  God,  C.  Loring  Brace,  p.  222. 

Note  4,  p.  188. 

"The  early  Hindus  did  not  find  any  difficulty  in  reconcil- 
ing the  most  different  and  sometimes  contradictory  opin- 
ions in  their  search  after  truth;  and  a  most  extraordinary 
medley  of  oracular  sayings  might  be  collected  from  the 
Upanishads,  even    from    those  which  are  genuine  and  com- 


3S6    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

paratively  ancient,  all  tending  to  elucidate  the  darkest 
points  of  philosophy  and  religion,  the  creation  of  the 
world,  the  nature  of  God,  the  relation  of  man  to  God,  and 
similar  subjects.  That  one  statement  should  be  contra- 
dicted by  another  seems  never  to  have  been  felt  as  any 
serious  difficulty."  Ancient  Sanskrit  Literature,  Max  Miil- 
ler,  pp.  320-21. 

Note  5,  p.  189. 

"What  could  you  expect  from  a  nation  whose  mothers 
have  to  live  in  perpetual  infancy? — married  in  the  early 
teens,  often  to  become  widows  before  they  are  out  of  their 
teens.  Can  these  be  the  mothers  of  heroes  and  patriots, 
and  statesmen?  The  women  of  India  have  really  no  exist- 
ence, as  apart  from  the  men.  Their  life  is  one  of  dire 
dependence.  And  as  are  the  women,  so,  naturally,  must 
be  the  men — dependent  upon  others  for  almost  everything 
in  life,  without  a  career  and  without  the  resources  for 
working  out  their  own  destiny.  They  have  nearly  lost  the 
power  of  initiative  for  purposes  of  self-improvement."  The 
Indian  Problem,  B.  M.  Malabari,  p.  42. 

"Now  let  us  first  try  these  tests  on  existing  heathen- 
ism. The  old  Vedic  religion,  so  much  talked  about  by 
philologists,  is  dead  and  gone,  and  so,  too,  are  the 
gods  it  worshiped.  And  the  glamor  that  used  to 
daze  simple  occidentals  when  the  Vedas  and  Upanishads 
existed  untranslated  in  archaic  Sanskrit,  has  vanished  now 
that  you  may  read  them  for  yourself  in  plain  English." 
Hinduism  and  Christianity,  Rev.  Geo.  T.  Washburn,  D.D.,  p.  7. 

"In  regard  to  women,  the  general  feeling  is  that  they 
are  the  necessary  machines  for  producing  children  (Manu 
ix,  96);  and  without  children  there  can  be  no  due  perform- 
ance of  the  funeral  rites  essential  to  the  peace  of  a  man's 
soul  after  death.  This  is  secured  by  early  marriages.  If 
the  law  required  the  consent  of  boys  and  girls  before  the 
marriage  ceremony,  they  might  decline  to  give  it.  Hence 
girls  are  betrothed  at  three  or  four  years  of  age,  and  go 
through  the  ceremony  of  marriage  at  seven  to  boys  of 
whom   they   know   nothing,  and  if  these  boy-husbands  die 


NOTES.  3S7 

they    remain  virgin-widows  all    their    lives."     Brahtnanism 
and  Hinduism,  Sir  Monier  Williams,  p.  387. 

"The  Indian  home,  instead  of  aiding  the  work  of  schools 
and  colleges,  in  a  large  number  of  cases  positively  retards 
it.  It  is  not  merely  the  general  ignorance  prevailing  in 
Indian  homes  that  makes  them  bear  so  unfavorably  on 
Western  culture,  in  its  best  sense,  but  the  positive  beliefs 
and  practices  which  obtain  there — and  which,  in  their  spirit 
are  totally  antagonistic  to  the  new  views  which  English 
education  inculcates  regarding  life  and  duty.  The  Indian 
home  is  a  scene  of  superstitious  beliefs  and  practices,  in 
which  the  high  school  and  college  student  has  lost  all  faith, 
and  which  he  has  even  learnt  to  despise.  Yet  he  quietly 
puts  up  with  these  and  even  seems  to  countenance  them 
because  his  new  light  has  supplied  him  with  nothing  which 
he  can  put  in  the  place  of  them,  nor  has  it  worked  on  him 
with  such  force  as  to  create  an  abhorrence  for  things  which 
he  considers  to  be  wrong."  Liberal  Edncation  in  India,  hy 
N.  G.  Welinkar,  p.  10. 

"It  is  true  that,  theoretically,  they  are  ignored  as  sep- 
arate units  in  society.  It  is  true  that  they  abstain  from 
pronouncing  their  husband's  name,  calling  him  simply 
'lord,'  or  'master,'  or  'the  chosen'  (vara);  and  they  them- 
selves are  never  directly  alluded  to  by  their  husbands  in 
conversation.  It  is  true  that  for  a  male  friend  to  mention 
their  names  or  even  inquire  after  their  health  would  be  a 
breach  of  etiquette.  It  is  true,  too,  that  their  life  is  spent 
in  petty  household  duties,  in  superintending  the  family 
cuisine,  in  a  wearisome  round  of  trivial  acts.  It  is  even 
true  that  in  religion  they  are  theoretically  placed  on  the 
same  level  as  Sudras.  They  are  allowed  no  formal  initia- 
tion into  the  Hindu  faith,  no  investiture  with  the  sacred 
thread,  no  spiritual  second  birth.  Marriage  is  to  them 
the  end  and  aim  of  life,  and  the  only  medium  of  regenera- 
tion. No  other  purificatory  rite  is  permitted  to  them. 
They  never  read,  repeat,  or  listen  to  the  Veda.  Yet,  for 
all  that,  the  women  of  India  are  the  mainstay  of  Hindu- 
ism. They  are  its  principal  stronghold  and  fortress. 
Without  their  support   both   Brahmanism    and    Hinduism 


388    CHRISTIANITY,  THE  WORLD-RELIGION. 

would    rapidly   collapse."     BraJimanisvi   and  Hinduism,   Sir 
Monier  Williams,  p.  388. 

"Therefore  we  say  that  the  Hindu  code  as  a  whole  is 
savage  and  antique,  and  that,  excluding  religious  excess 
and  debauchery,  it  is  on  a  par  with  the  modern  ethical  code 
only  nominally."     Religions  of  India,  Hopkins,  p.  555. 

Note  6,  p.  196. 

"It  is  to  the  British  government  that  we  owe  our  deliv- 
erance from  oppression  and  misrule,  from  darkness  and 
distress,  from  ignorance  and  superstition.  Those  enlight- 
ened ideas  which  have  changed  the  very  life  of  the  nation, 
and  have  gradually  brought  about  such  wondrous  improve- 
ment in  native  society,  are  the  gifts  of  that  government ; 
and  so  likewise  the  inestimable  boon  of  freedom  of  thought 
and  action,  which  we  so  justly  prize."  Lectures  in  India, 
Keshub  Chunder  Sen,  p.  15. 


LECTURE    V. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    FOR   THE    FIFTH    LECTURE. 

The  leading  works  on  the  life  of  Jesus  may  be  enumerated 
as  follows: 

Andrews,  Life  of  Our  Lord. 

Weiss,   The  Life  of   Christ,  3  volumes  (T.  &  T.  Clarke, 

Edinburgh). 
Edersheim,  Life  and  Times  of  Jesus,  the  Messiah. 
Beyschlag,  Das  Leben  Jesu. 

Pressens6,  Jesus  Christ,  His  Life,   Times,  and  Work. 
Didon,   The  Life  of  Jesus,  2  volumes.     (The  best  Roman 

Catholic  life.) 
Keim,  History  of  Jesus  of  Nasara. 
Here  also  may  be  mentioned   Fairbairn's    The  Place  of 

Christ  in  Modern  Theology. 
Phillips  Brooks,   The  Lnfiuence  of  Jesus. 
George  Dana  Board  man,  Christ,  the   Unifier  of  ILuman- 

ity,  in  History  of  Parliament  of  Religions. 

For  the  lives  of  the  other  great  founders  of  religions,  see: 
For  Buddha: 

Rhys   David's   Buddhism,  S.  P.  C.  A'.,  and   Hibbert  Lec- 
tures. 
Oldenberg,  Buddha  (translated  from  the  German). 

For  Confucius: 

Legge,  Life  and  Teachings  of  Confucius. 

The  same,  Religions  of  China. 

R.  K.  Douglas,  Confucianisjn,  S.  P.  C.  K. 

For  Zoroaster 

The  Encyclopaedia  Britannica  article  on  Zoroaster. 


389 


39°    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

For  Mohammed: 

Sir   William    Muir,     The   Life   of  Mahomet,    4   volumes 

(hostile,  though  judicial). 
Syed    Ameer    Ali,    Life    and    Teachings    of   Mohammed 
(written  by  a  believer). 
For  Socrates: 

Plato' s  Apology  and  Crito. 

Stanley's   Lecture  on    Socrates  in  the  third   series  of  his 

Jewish  Church. 
Wenley,  Socrates  and  Christ. 

Note  i,  p.  209. 

"It  seems  that  the  Christ  that  has  come  to  us  is  an 
Englishman,  with  English  manners  and  customs  about  him, 
and  with  the  temper  and  spirit  of  an  Englishman  in  him. 
Hence  it  is  that  the  Hindu  people  shrink  back  and  say: 
Who  is  this  revolutionary  reformer  who  is  trying  to  sap 
the  very  foundations  of  native  society  and  establish  here 
an  outlandish  faith  and  civilization  quite  incompatible  with 
oriental  instincts  and  ideas?"  Lectures  in  India,  Keshub 
Chunder  Sen,  p.  282. 

"To  us  Asiatics,  therefore,  Christ  is  doubly  interesting, 
and  his  religion  is  entitled  to  our  peculiar  regard  as  an 
altogether  Oriental  affair.  The  more  this  great  fact  is 
pondered,  the  less  I  hope  will  be  the  antipathy  and  hatred 
of  European  Christians  against  Oriental  nationalities,  and 
the  greater  the  interest  of  the  Asiatics  in  the  teachings  of 
Christ.  And  thus  in  Christ,  Europe  and  Asia,  the  East  and 
the  West,  may  learn  to  find  harmony  and  unity."  Lectures 
in  India,  Keshub  Chunder  Sen,  p.  26. 

"Saint,  Son  of  God,  Elder  Brother,  it  is  impossible  to 
honor  and  love  Thee  too  much.  I  have  sometimes  failed 
to  give  Thee  Thy  due;  but  alas!  I  find  it  too  true  on  the 
other  hand  that,  in  obeying  and  honoring  Thee,  men  put 
the  spirit  of  God  in  the  background  altogether.  I  would 
rather  be  true  to  God  than  to  man,  though  I  know  God  is 
in  man,  and  honor  to  man  is  one  of  the  highest  virtues.  O 
teach  me  Thy  true  worship,  my  God,  so  that  my  highest 
love  and  honor  to  Thee  will  be  the  highest  love  and  honor 
to  Thy  Son."     Heart-Beats,  Mozoomdar,  p.  171. 


NOTES.  391 

"Strength  was  natural  to  Thee,  O  Son  of  God,  as  to  the 
young  lion — strength  to  suffer  and  to  act.  Thy  words 
were  as  mighty  as  Thy  silence.  I  trust  in  Thee  to  bear  me 
in  Thy  strong  arms,  as  the  shepherd  bears  his  weakling 
lamb.  Cover  me  in  Thy  garment  of  protecting  faith,  and 
change  Thou  me  into  Thy  very  self."  Heart-Beats,  Mo- 
zoomdar,  p.  129. 

Note  2,  p.  214. 

"With  regard  to  animal  life,  I  know  that  it  is  often 
claimed  that  Buddha  was  more  compassionate  than  Jesus. 
I  think  he  was  less  discriminating.  Jesus  had  a  tender 
regard  for  all  animal  life,  and  taught  that  even  the  spar- 
rows were  the  subjects  of  his  Father's  care;  but  never- 
theless he  believed  that  men  were  in  God's  sight  of  'more 
value  than  many  sparrows.'  He  rebuked  the  stiff  conserv- 
atism of  the  Pharisees,  which  would  have  forbidden  the 
finding  of  a  lost  sheep  on  the  Sabbath,  or  the  rescuing  of  a 
dumb  beast  from  suffering.  Buddhism  is  perhaps  much 
more  particular  in  avoiding  the  destruction  of  insect  life 
than  Christianity,  but  on  that  score  I  think  Buddhism  has 
yet  to  reckon  with  the  modern  science  of  bacteriology,  and 
the  question  whether  the  living  germs  of  disease  shall 
destroy  or  be  destroyed,  and  whether  it  is  less  merciful 
on  the  whole  that  animals  and  fishes  shall  be  food  for 
each  other  and  for  man  than  that  myriads  of  living 
microbes  shall  destroy  them  by  the  slow  torture  of  disease. 
Life  and  death  are  shown  by  science  to  be  so  balanced  that 
in  the  total  of  existence  death  is  as  beneficent  as  life.  The 
economy  of  the  sea  is  one  of  constant  carnage,  and  so  also 
with  the  earth;  but  for  this  the  sea  would  soon  become  a 
solid  mass  of  suffering,  living  forms,  and  the  earth  would 
be  uninhabitable  by  men.  Christian  precept  is  humane, 
but  it  is  discriminating.  It  would  destroy  the  wolves  and 
serpents  of  India  rather  than  allow  them  every  year  to 
destroy  thousands  of  the  people,  and  it  would  allow  the 
Esquimaux  to  feed  on  fish  rather  than  suffer  the  extinction 
of  their  race."  The  Open  Court,  F.  F.  Ellin  wood,  p,  56,  of 
January,  1897. 

"If,  therefore,  it  be  asked  whether  the  Christian  idea  of 


392     CHIUSTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

charity  is  a  higher  thing  than  the  Buddhist  conception  of 
a  sympathy  which  passes  over  every  barrier  of  caste  and 
race  and  circumstance,  and  which  in  its  universality  em- 
braces all  men  and  even  all  animals,  there  is  a  ready 
answer.  Buddhism,  like  the  abstract  pantheism  it  opposes, 
has  no  distinguishing  respect  for  the  spiritual  nature  of 
man.  It  is  a  leveling  doctrine  which  meets  the  indiscrim- 
inate 'Whatever  is  is  right,'  of  Brahmanism,  with  an 
equally  indiscriminate  'Whatever  is  is  wrong.'  It  cannot 
set  the  qualities  that  make  a  man  above  those  that  make  a 
beast.  And  if  its  love  extends  to  all  men,  and,  we  may 
even  say,  to  all  living  beings,  it  is  not  that  it  regards  them 
as  having  any  real  value  in  their  individual  existence,  but 
that  it  looks  upon  them  as  all  equally  sufferers  from  the 
misery  of  existence.  Hence  it  might  be  said  that  the  uni- 
versal charity  of  the  Buddhist  was  only  his  second  highest 
virtue;  and  that  it  held  even  so  high  a  place  as  this  only 
because  such  charity  is  the  negation  of  all  special  regard 
for  individual  things."  The  Evolution  of  Religion,  Edward 
Caird,  p.   365. 

Note  3,  p.  228. 

"How  can  there  be  any  comparison  between  Christ  and 
any  other  man?  His  personal  goodness  and  faith  alone 
would  confer  supreme  eminence  on  him.  When  to  that  is 
added  the  strange  element  of  unexampled  suffering  and 
neglect,  such  as  would  have  crushed  any  other  man's  soul, 
does  he  not  become  unique?  But  that  suffering,  instead  of 
producing  bitterness,  was  an  endless  source  of  love  and 
sympathy  for  others,  who  never  felt  for  him.  Nay,  more, 
the  suffering  takes  the  dignity  of  death.  If  death  had 
ended  all,  Christ  would  have  been  one  of  the  greatest 
names  in  history.  But  he  rose  from  death,  and  the  world 
to-day  bears  the  teeming  evidence  that  Christ  lives.  The 
dead  become  alive  when  they  trust  in  His  name;  the  living 
become  more  alive  when  they  love  Him.  All  goodness, 
sweetness,  wisdom,  are  crowned  with  the  meek  dignity  of 
the  Son  of  Man.  All  sorrow,  sin,  suffering,  are  purified 
in  His  spirit.  Where  is  such  another  on  earth?"  Heart- 
Beats,  Mozoomdar,  p.  13. 


NOTES.  393 

Note  4,  p.  238. 

"Mr.  M.  B.  Malabari,  in  his  recent  tours,  has  had  very 
painful  experiences  of  the  strong  and  active  antagonism 
that  exists  between  the  Hindus  and  the  Mohammedans. 
Writing  to  the  The  Indian  Spectator  of  a  recent  date,  Mr. 
Malabari  says:  'At  Fatehpur  and  other  places  I  heard  the 
Hindus  reviling  the  Mohammedans;  here,  at  Jhansi,  I  find 
the  Mohammedans  execrating  and  incriminating  the 
Hindus.  So  here  we  are,  dreaming  of  national  unity,  but 
rent  asunder,  in  real  life,  by  interracial  dissensions; 
dreaming  of  universal  peace  when  strife  and  struggle  dog 
us  at  every  step;  dreaming  of  a  common  cause  against 
foreigners,  but  kept  by  the  same  foreigners  from  cutting  one 
another's  throats!  Wide,  very  wide  is  the  gulf  between 
the  dream  and  the  reality.  And,  upon  my  honor,  the  gulf 
is  widening  more  and  more  in  some  respects.'  "  The 
Queen,  of  Calcutta,  June  28,  1897,  p.  4. 


LECTURE    VI. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    FOR   THE   SIXTH    LECTURE. 

On  the  history  of  Christianity,  the  best  books  are: 
Schaff,  History  of  Christianity,  6  volumes. 
Fisher,  History  of  the  Christian  Church.     (A  manual  his- 
tory.) 
Moeller,  History  of  the  Christian  Church,  2  volumes. 

For  the  early  history  of  Christianity,  see: 

Pressense,  Early  Years  of  Christianity,  4  volumes. 

For  Christianity  and  the  Supernatural,  see: 

Fisher,   The  Supernatural  Oi-igin  of  Christianity. 

For  Christianity  and  Miracles,  see: 

Bruce,   The  Miraculous  Element  in  the  Gospels. 
For  Christianity  and  Science,  see: 

A.  J.  Balfour,  The  Foundations  of  Belief. 

A.  D.  White,  A   History  of  the    Warfare  of  Science  with 
Theology. 
For  Revelation  and  Inspiration,  see: 

Ewald,  Revelation,  Its  A^ature  and  Record. 

Bruce,   The  Chief  End  of  Revelation. 

Sanday,  Inspiration,  Bampton  Lectures;  1893. 

Horton,  Inspiration  and  the  Bible. 

The  same.  Revelation  and  the  Bible. 
For  Christianity  and  History,  see: 

Fairbairn,  The  City  of  God. 

Sell,    The  Church  in  the  Mirror  of  History. 

Dale,   The  Living  Christ  and  the  Four  Gospels. 
On  the  general  subject  of  the  Lecture,  see: 

Bruce,  Apologetics. 

Fisher,   Tlie  Grounds  of  Theistic  and  Christian  Belief. 

394 


lYOTES.  3S5 

Note  i,  p.  251. 

See  Robertson  Smith's  Prophets  of  Israel,  pp.  1-7. 

Note  2,  p.  253. 

"But  religion  in  India  is  dead  or  decaying  in  the  ranks 
where  it  is  most  potent  for  a  widefelt  constructive  influ- 
ence." Tke  Indian  Eye  on  English  Life,  by  B  M.  Mala- 
bari,  p.  125. 

"The  best  among  the  Greek  philosophers  confessed 
their  need  of  some  new  power  to  give  practical  effect  to 
their  theories;  and  who  can  say  that  the  life  of  Greece  was 
not  greatly  deteriorated  in  the  second  and  third  centuries 
of  our  era  from  what  it  had  been  in  the  days  of  Aristotle 
and  Demosthenes?  The  ironical  strength  of  Socrates  had 
no  redeeming  force.  The  beautiful  life  of  Marcus  Aurelius 
gives  the  impression  of  resignation,  not  of  hope.  The  excel- 
lent maxims  of  Confucius  at  most  bound  fast  the  life  of 
China  in  an  iron  law.  Buddhism  gave  peace,  but  it  was, 
at  least  as  to  the  social  and  political  life,  the  peace  of 
resigned  despair.  Mohammed's  grand  iconoclasm  spent 
itself  almost  in  its  first  onset,  and  has  failed  to  exhibit 
any  new  principle  of  vitality.  But  the  cross  of  Christ  is 
new  in  every  age,  and  has  changed  the  face  of  the  world, 
and  has  been  the  spring  of  civilization  and  of  an  untiring 
progress."  The  World  as  the  Subject  0/  Redemption,  W.  H. 
Fremantle,  p.  26. 

Note  3,  p.  266. 

"There  is,  to  use  a  phrase  of  grammar,  a  proleptic,  or 
anticipatory,  Christianity,  of  which  we  may  see  traces  deep 
down  in  the  convictions  of  the  various  races  of  men.  It 
shows  itself  partially  and  fitfully  in  their  religions,  but 
more  in  their  philosophies,  their  family  life,  and  their  laws. 
In  these  God  has  always  had  a  witness  among  them. 
Christ  came  in  the  fulness  of  time.  The  ground  was  laid 
on  all  sides  in  preparation  for  Him;  the  human  race  was 
growing  towards  Him;  so  that  we  must  look  at  the  whole 
human  development  as  one,  and  on  Christian  spirit  as  the 
root  of  all   that  is  good  and  true  in  it,  and  on  Christ  Him- 


39^  ciiRiSTiANirr,  the  world-religion. 

self  as   its    crown."      The  World  as  the  Subject  of  Redemption, 
W.  H.  Fremantle,  p.  250. 

Note  4,  p.  266. 

By  miracles  we  mean  works  of  ever-continuing  wonder, 
worthy  of  the  Divine  character,  the  results  of  the  exercise 
of  God's  power,  put  forth  not  in  the  order  of  the  usual 
course  of  Nature,  for  the  purpose  of  attesting  a  Divine  rev- 
elation. This,  of  course,  excludes  all  wonders  which  the 
progress  of  science  may  explain,  and  all  the  lying  won- 
ders of  evil  magicians  and  necromancers.  It  lifts  the 
miracle  to  its  proper  place  as  a  Divine  act  performed  for 
the  highest  ends.  Now  Jesus  Christ  appealed  to  such 
miracles  as  among  the  evidences  of  His  supernatural  com- 
mission. "That  ye  may  know  that  the  Son  of  Man  hath 
power  on  earth  to  forgive  sins  (then  saiih  he  to  the  sick 
of  the  palsy),  'Arise,  take  up  thy  bed  and  go  unto  thine 
house.'"  What  does  a  miracle  show?  What  do  these 
events,  wrought  by  the  direct  interposition  of  Divine  power, 
indicate?  They  prove  not  only  the  truth  of  the  message, 
but  the  Divine  authority  of  the  messenger.  It  is  the 
authority  which  miracles  give  to  the  Gospels  which  appears 
offensive  to  some  men.  The  effort  to-day  is  not  to  deny 
the  moral  truth  of  the  Scriptures,  but  to  put  the  Gospels 
on  the  same  level  with  the  ethical  writings  of  Socrates  and 
Seneca,  of  George  Fox  and  Swedenborg.  Now  I  believe 
that  it  is  a  Christian  duty  to  welcome  truth  from  any 
quarter,  and  to  cherish  humane  thoughts  towards  all  relig- 
ions, so  far  as  they  are  true;  but  if  God  has  interposed, 
out  of  love  toward  man,  and  set  the  seal  of  miracle  on  cer- 
tain Scriptures  which  we  call  the  Gospels,  then  there 
belong  to  them  a  dignity,  an  inspiration  and  an  authority 
setting  them  apart  from  and  above  all  other  writings. 
John  Foster  has  called  a  miracle  "the  ringing  of  the  great 
bell  of  the  universe,  summoning  the  multitudes  to  hear 
the  sermon."  And  as  Moses  in  the  wilderness,  when  he 
saw  the  burning  bush  which  was  not  consumed,  turned 
aside,  and  then  heard  the  voice  of  the  Lord  from  the  midst 
of  the  flaming  shrub,  so  miracles  have  been  the  burning 
bush,  drawing   men   aside,  both   to  hear  this  Divine  word, 


NOTES.  397 

and  to  receive  it  as  of  Divine  authority.  Over  such  Scrip- 
tures flames  an  awful  "light  which  never  was  on  sea  or 
land,"  a  light  above  that  of  the  sun,  because  it  comes 
directly  from  the  highest  heaven,  and  the  voice  which 
speaks  to  us  can  be  no  other  than  the  voice  of  God.  And 
though  we  may  stand  with  bowed  and  uncovered  heads 
before  the  great  sages  and  singers  of  humanity,  yet  when 
we  come  before  this  Book,  we  may  well  heed  the  word 
which  says,  "Put  off  thy  shoes  from  off  thy  feet  for  the  place 
whereon  thou  standest  is  holy  ground." 

I  believe  that  the  miracles,  however,  are  far  more  than 
the  bell  calling  us  to  hear  the  sermon:  they  are  themselves 
a  heavenly  part  of  the  divine  discourse,  giving  us  a  dis- 
closure of  God  as  helpful  and  blessed  as  any  which  shines 
from  the  Scriptures.  And,  besides  all  else,  the  miracles 
clinch  our  faith  at  points  where  it  is  weakest;  they  set  the 
seal  of  Heaven  on  the  title-deeds  of  our  salvation.  I  can- 
not think  that  any  other  document  is  worthy  of  such  a 
celestial  stamp.  Were  not  the  miracles  there  to  convince 
the  human  mind,  the  wayward  heart  would  often  be  self- 
deceived  into  giving  up  a  book  that  so  rebukes  its  wicked- 
ness. And  were  it  not  for  the  miracles  we  might  distrust 
such  glorious  promises  as  are  therein  made  to  the  believ- 
ers in  Christ.  It  is  not  so  difficult  to  believe  the  hard 
things  of  the  Word  of  God,  as  to  believe  the  glorious  things 
which  are  spoken  to  the  Christian.  When  the  Bible  speaks 
of  judgment,  it  has  the  power  of  conscience  on  its  side. 
But  when  the  Bible  speaks  of  mercy  to  sinners,  of  forgive- 
ness to  rebels,  of  crowns  and  scepters,  and  sonship  with 
God,  of  Heavenly  worlds  with  gates  of  pearl  and  streets  of 
gold  and  the  River  of  Life,  and  joys  surpassing  all  our 
dreams,  then  it  is  that  we  need,  most  of  all,  the  miracu- 
lous elements  of  the  Gospel  to  reinvigorate  and  perpetuate 
our  faltering  faith.  This  Book  of  Books  which  has  entered 
into  the  highest  literature,  which  has  shaped  the  noblest 
art,  which  has  been  the  life-blood  of  civilization,  the 
mother  of  liberty,  the  enfranchisement  of  the  oppressed, 
the  conqueror  of  barbarism  ;  this  Book  which  has  called 
forth  the  eulogies  of  the  greatest  minds,  which  has  fur- 
nished  the   subject  for   the   most  profound  and  ennobling 


398    CHRISTIANITY,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

study,  which  has  brought  solace  to  the  suffering  and  hope 
to  the  dying,  and  which  makes  itself  at  home  in  all  lands, 
amid  all  nations,  in  all  centuries,  is  so  wonderful  that  it 
alone  appears  worthy  of  such  a  Heavenly  seal  as  miracles 
have  given  it. 

Note  5,  p.  267. 

If  any  are  determined  by  a  previously  formed  philoso- 
phy, not  to  believe  in  miracles,  however  attested,  even 
though  by  the  Word  of  Him  who  claimed  to  be  the  Son  of 
God,  and  who  in  the  consciousness  of  perfect  truth  and 
holiness  appealed  to  His  miracles,  they  will  contrive  to 
reject  them.  But  once  acknowledge  a  personal  God  who 
loves  mankind  and,  as  John  Stuart  Mill  has  conclusively 
said,  all  rational  objection  to  miracles  disappears.  All 
who  believe  in  God  believe  that  a  Divine  Person  has  already 
bridged  the  non-existent  and  the  existent,  the  non-living 
and  the  living, the  non-intelligent  and  the  intelligent ;  so  that, 
as  Dr.  Peabody  of  Harvard  has  shown,  "Miracles  make  a 
large  part  of  the  history  of  the  material  universe."  All 
who  see  a  personal  God  working  in  and  through  the  phe- 
nomena of  the  visible  and  the  intellectual  world,  mani- 
festing His  glory  in  the  birth  of  a  star  and  in  the  birth  of 
a  Shakespeare,  showing  forth  His  power  in  the  blossoms 
which  cover  with  beauty  the  sods  of  springtime,  and  in  the 
galaxies  which  sprinkle  the  midnight  with  sidereal  fire,  all 
who  see  a  personal  God  in  the  annual  resurrection  of 
Nature,  will  not  deny  that  such  a  God  can  raise  the  dead. 
Such  a  denial,  as  even  Rousseau  said,  "would  be  impious  if 
it  were  not  absurd.  It  is  logical  for  one  who  does  not 
believe  in  a  personal  God  to  deny  the  possibility  of  mir- 
acles. All  that  Hume  makes  out  in  his  celebrated  essay, 
is,  that  no  amount  of  evidence  can  prove  a  miracle  to  an 
atheist.  And  if  God  is  thought  to  be  an  impersonal,  inde- 
scribable, unknowable  abstraction,  or  if  He  is  regarded 
as  a  great  magician  who  has  retired  into  the  infinite  deeps 
of  space  and  left  the  management  of  our  earthly  life  to 
dumb,  mechanical  laws,  in  the  midst  of  which  He  Him- 
self can  make  no  sign,  then  of  course  we  talk  in  vain,  to 
those  thinking  thus,  about  miraculous  interferences.     Such 


NOTES.  399 

a  poor  and  helpless  exile  as  some  men  hold  God  to  be 
would  never  have  called  forth  Lazarus  from  his  sepulchre 
or  empowered  the  Christian  Apostles  to  heal  the  sick.  But, 
once  acknowledge  an  omnipresent  God,  working  in  and 
through  all  natural  laws,  and,  as  unbelievers  themselves 
confess,  the  objections  to  miracles  vanish. 

There  are  historic  certainties,  resting,  it  is  true,  for  their 
evidence  on  testimony,  but  for  which  the  evidence  is  so 
weighty  that  doubt  is  unreasonable.  The  voyage  of 
Columbus,  the  death  of  Napoleon  Bonaparte  at  St.  Helena, 
these  are  historic  certainties,  though  they  rest  on  the  credi- 
bility of  human  testimony.  Such  a  complexity  of  proba- 
bilities encloses  the  Christian  faith  that  Christ  rose  from 
the  dead,  and  such  a  complexity  of  absurdities  and  moral 
impossibilities  beset  the  denial  of  His  resurrection,  that 
the  event  must  be  placed  where  Greenleaf,  the  great  author- 
ity on  legal  evidence,  places  it,  in  the  category  of  historic 
certainties.  When  we  rise  to  behold  this  mighty  miracle 
as  the  crowning  revelation  of  the  nature  of  Jesus,  it  seems 
altogether  befitting  that  such  a  nature  should  receive  such 
a  diadem.  The  resurrection  belongs  to  the  other  parts  of 
an  unequalled  life;  it  is  not  an  isolated  fact.  And,  as  we 
abide  in  thought  with  the  historic  Jesus,  as  we  contem- 
plate the  perfection  of  His  goodness,  the  originality  of  His 
claims,  the  matchlessness  of  His  wisdom,  and  as  we  hear 
from  His  sinless  lips  His  sublime  words  concerning  Him- 
self, declaring  that  He  had  power  to  lay  down  His  life  and 
power  to  take  it  again,  it  seems  that  a  being  of  another 
order  and  from  a  higher  world  was  manifest  in  the  Man  of 
Galilee,  and  for  such  a  life  it  seems  congruous  that  there 
should  be  an  end  unique  and  glorious.  And  when  we  note 
that  Divine  hopes  of  immortality  are  made  to  walk  the 
earth  with  assurance  beneath  them  by  the  resurrection  of 
Jesus,  when  we  see  in  His  tomb  the  Divine  purpose,  which 
had  been  dimly  disclosed  to  the  men  of  old,  breaking  open 
at  last  to  fully  reveal  man's, eternal  home  in  the  bosom  of 
God,  all  the  prophecies  of  hope  and  conscience  and  love 
verified  as  the  rejoicing  Heavenly  Bridegroom  came  out 
of  His  chamber  of  death  on  the  Resurrection  morning,  and 
when  we   perceive   how   godless  the  moral  universe  would 


400    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

seem  if  such  a  divine  life  as  Christ's  had  in  fact  been 
beaten  down  into  hopeless  defeat  by  the  Crucifixion,  then 
all  the  overwhelming  and  invincible  testimony  that  Jesus 
did  rise  again  appears  to  be  testimony  to  what  is  in  accord 
with  the  higher  order  of  the  world,  while  the  great  miracle 
itself  is  explained  by  its  divine  purpose  that  eternal  life 
should  be  disclosed  to  men,  and  that  Christ,  our  redeem- 
ing King,  who  died  for  us  on  the  Cross,  "should  be 
declared  the  Son  of  God  with  power  by  the  Resurrection 
from  the  dead." 

The  third  day  after  the  crucifixion  of  Jesus,  the  world 
began  to  be  transformed.  A  company  of  humble  men 
rose  out  of  despair  into  ecstacy,  out  of  weakness  into 
unequalled  spiritual  power.  The  first  day  of  the  week 
began  to  be  as  sacred  to  them  as  the  ancient  Sabbath  of 
Jehovah.  Obstinate  and  almost  ineradicable  Jewish  preju- 
dices were  uprooted,  and  a  divine  and  world-wide  philan- 
thropy was  planted  in  their  hearts.  When  fifty  days  had 
passed  there  came  into  their  souls  such  heavenly  power 
that  they  filled  a  vast  number  from  every  nation  with  their 
faith  and  their  love.  A  new  City  of  God  rose  out  of  the 
empire  of  the  Caesars;  the  conversion  of  a  hostile  and 
wicked  world  is  nothing  less  than  a  Divine  testimony  to 
the  supreme  fact  on  which  the  Church  was  builded;  and 
having  reached  this  point,  it  would  seem  that  the  evidence 
of  the  truth  of  this  event  could  scarcely  be  made  stronger 
by  the  device  of  man,  or,  I  say  it  reverently,  by  the  wis- 
dom of  God  Himself.  At  least  we  are  willing  to  say  with 
that  relentless  and  destructive  German  critic,  Evvald,  "That 
nothing  stands  more  historically  certain  than  that  Jesus 
rose  from  the  dead  and  appeared  again  to  His  followers, 
and  that  their  seeing  Him  again  was  the  beginning  of  a 
higher  faith  and  of  all  their  Christian  work  in  the  world." 


LECTURE    VII. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY    FOR   SEVENTH    LECTURE. 

The  Official  History  of  the  World's  Parliament  oj  Religions,  2 

volumes,  Hill  &  Shuman,  Chicago. 
Le  Congres  des  Religions,  G.  Bonet-Maury,  Paris. 
Die  Welt-Religionen  atif  dent    Columbia-Congress    von  Chicago, 

Prof.  Wilhelm  von  Zehender,  Miinchen. 
//   Parlamenta    delle   Religioni   e    I'lrenica    Interconfessionale, 

Emilio  Comba,  Rome. 
La  Loi  du  Progres  dans  les  Religions,  Goblet  d'Alviella,  Brus- 
sels. 
The  Chorus  of  Faith,  Jenkin  Lloyd  Jones. 
Le  Parlement  des  Religions,  Revue  de  I ' Histoire  des  Religions, 

September  and  October,  1893. 
Review  of  the  World's  Religious  Congresses,  Chicago  and  New 

York,  1893,  L.  P.  Mercer. 

See  also. 

C.  H.  Toy,   The  Ne-cv  World,  December,  1893. 
Paul  Carus,   The  Forum,  June,  1894. 

C.  C.  Bonney,   The  New   Church   Reviezv,  January,  1894. 
George  William  Knox,   The  Church  at  Home  and  Abroad, 

June,   1894. 

D.  S.  Schaff,  Homiletic  Review,  December,  1893. 
Joseph  Cook,  Ottr  Day,  throughout  1894. 

Morgan    Dix,    A   Parliament   of   Religions,    New    York, 

James  Pott  &  Co.,  1894. 
F.    Max    Muller,   Deutsche   Rundschau,    Berlin,    March, 

1895. 

F.  Max  Miiller,   The  Arena,  December,  1894. 

E.  Portalie,  Etudes  Religieuses,  Paris,  September,  1894. 

G.  Bonet-Maury,  Revtie  des  Detix  Mondes,  August,  1894, 
Frederick   Passy,   Le  Congres  des  Religions,  a   Chicago,  en 

iSgj. 

401 


402    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Frederick  Passy,  Le  Congrh  des  Religions,  Paris. 

George  Dana  Boardman,  Tlic  rarliatiient  of  Religions, 
Philadelphia  Baptist  Print,  1893. 

The  White  City  and  the  Parliament  of  Religions,  two  ser- 
mons by  Rev.  M.  J.  Savage,  Boston,  Geo.  H.  Ellis. 

Note   i,  p.  296. 

For  an  interesting  account  of  Akbar's  Council,  see  the 
life  of  that  emperor  by  Le  Compte  F.  A.  de  Noer,  trans- 
lated from  the  German  by  Professor  G.  Bonet-Maury, 
Leyden,  E.  J.  Brill,  1883;  Paris,  Ernest  Leroux.  Perhaps 
the  most  interesting  part  is  the  story  of  the  Jesuits  who,  by 
the  invitation  of  the  Emperor,  made  a  difficult  journey  of 
forty-three  days  from  Goa,  arriving  at  the  Emperor's 
palace  in  Fatehpur-sikri  on  the  iSth  of  February,  1580. 
The  Three  Jesuit  "padres"  were  Rodolfo  Aquaviva, 
Antonio  de  Monserrat  and  Francisco  Enriques,  men  of 
great  ability,  who  presented  to  the  Emperor,  among  other 
things,  a  new  edition  of  the  Bible  and  two  images,  one  of 
Jesus  and  the  other  of  the  Virgin  Mary.  (To  facilitate 
their  conferences  with  the  Emperor  they  were  soon  given 
apartments   in    the   palace   itself.) 

In  order  to  give  some  idea  of  the  bitterness  which  char- 
acterized this  so-called  Parliament  of  Religions,  I  quote  the 
following  paragraphs  from  Le  Compte  F.  A.  de  Noer's  His- 
tory, Vol.  I,  pp.  326-327: 

"Les  conferences  du  jeudi  soir  a  I'lbadat-Khana  offrirent 
le  spectacle  attrayant  d'un  Concile,  ou  presque  toutes  les 
grandes  religions  de  I'univers  fetaient  representees.  Les 
'Padres'  plaiderent  leur  cause  avec  la  superiorite  que  leur 
donnait  I'erudition  et  la  subtilite  scolastiques ;  et,  comme 
du  Jarric  le  raconte  avec  une  visible  satisfaction,  les  theo- 
logiens  musulmans  ne  trouverent  pas  d'  objections  suffi- 
santes.  Ironie  singuliere  de  I'histoire !  Les  Maures  mus- 
ulmans avaient  un  jour  fait  fleurir  toutes  les  sciences, 
y  compris  la  dialectique  d'Aristotle  dans  la  presqu'ile 
Pyreneenne;  leurs  successeurs  Chretiens  avaient  recuilli  le 
riche  heritage  et  c'etaienc  eux,  a  leur  tour,  qui  retorquaient 
contre   les   sectateurs   du  Coran  les  armes  forgees  par  des 


NOTES.  403 

musulmans.  Ces  maudits  moines  appliquaient  la  denom- 
ination et  les  attributs  du  diable  a  Mahomet,  le  meilleur 
des  Prophetes  (que  la  grace  de  Dieu  repose  sur  lui  et  sur 
toule  sa  raaison !)  ce  que  des  demons  euxmeme  n'eussent 
pas  ose  faire. " 

Note  2,  p.  298. 

Among  the  Anglican  divines,  giving  their  adhesion  to 
the  Parliament  of  Religions,  may  be  mentioned,  Dr.  Car- 
penter, bishop  of  Ripon,  the  late  Bishop  Phillips  Brooks  of 
Massachusetts,  Bishop  Thomas  M.  Clark  of  Rhode  Island, 
Bishop  Whitehead  of  Pittsburg,  Bishop  Grafton  of  Fond 
du  Lac,  Bishop  McLaren  of  Chicago,  Bishop  Spaulding  of 
Colorado,  Bishop  Scarborough  of  New  Jersey,  the  late 
Bishop  Knickerbacker  of  Indiana,  Bishop  Seymour  of 
Springfield,  Bishop  Whittaker  of  Pennsylvania,  Bishop 
Whipple  of  Minnesota,  Bishop  Sullivan  of  Algoma,  Bishop 
Tuttle  of  Missouri,  Bishop  Gillespie  of  Grand  Rapids, 
Bishop  Hare  of  South  Dakota,  Bishop  Burgess  of  Quincy, 
Bishop  Perry  of  Iowa,  Bishop  Paret  of  Maryland,  Bishop 
Nicholson  of  Milwaukee,  Bishop  Johnston  of  Western 
Texas,  Bishop  Smith  of  Sydney,  Australia,  Bishop  Holly 
of  Hayti.        « 

Note  3,  p.  299. 

"For  wfhat  am  I  going — for  vain  glory?  Nay.  To  run 
away  from  my  persecutors?  Nay.  For  physical  pleasure? 
Nay.  For  what,  then?  To  lay  the  noblest  aspirations  of 
my  country  and  my  people  before  the  judgment-seat  of 
mankind;  to  glorify  God  in  the  land  of  the  living,  as  I 
have  glorified  Him  in  this  land  of  death;  to  bear  witness 
that  the  spirit  of  God  is  infinitely  active  and  alive,  still 
evolving  human  destiny  to  higher  inheritances,  and  shap- 
ing the  future  so  much  more  glorious  than  the  past;  that 
the  ideal  may  be  made  actual;  that  aspiration,  communion, 
prayer,  may  be  assured  in  their  reality  by  the  acceptance 
of  all  nations;  that  the  New  Dispensation  of  God  preached 
to  a  few  hitherto  may  dawn  upon  the  whole  world,  I  go." 
Heart-Beats,  Mozoomdar,  p.  91. 


404    CHRISTIANITT,  THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

Note  4,  p.  301. 

"There  are  few  things  which  I  so  truly  regret  having 
missed  as  the  great  Parliament  of  Religions,  held  in  Chi- 
cago as  a  part  of  the  Columbian  Exposition.  Who  would 
have  thought  that  what  was  announced  as  simply  an  aux- 
iliary branch  of  that  exhibition  could  have  developed  into 
what  it  was;  could  have  become  the  most  important  part  of 
that  immense  undertaking;  could  have  become  the  greatest 
success  of  the  past  year,  and,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  say,  could 
now  take  its  place  as  one  of  the  most  memorable  events  in 
the  history  of  the  world?  Even  in  America,  where  people 
have  not  fully  lost  the  faculty  of  admiring,  and  of  giving 
hearty  expression  to  their  admiration,  the  greatness  of  that 
event  seems  to  me  not  yet  fully  appreciated,  while  in  other 
countries  vague  rumors  only  have  as  yet  reached  the  pub- 
lic at  large  of  what  took  place  in  the  Religious  Parliament 
at  Chicago.  Here  and  there,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  ridicule 
also,  the  impotent  weapon  of  ignorance  and  envy,  has  been 
used  against  what  ought  to  have  been  sacred  to  every  man 
of  sense  and  culture;  but  ridicule  is  blown  away  like  offen- 
sive smoke;  the  windows  are  opened,  and  the  fresh  air  of 
truth  streams  in."  Prof.  F.  Max  Miiller,  The  Arena,  De- 
cember, 1894. 

"Die  grossartigste  und  vielleicht  folgenreichste  Idee, 
die  in  unserem,  seinem  Ende  entgegeneilenden  Jahrhun- 
dert  zur  Ausfiihrung  gelangt  ist,  war  die  Versammlung 
von  Vertretern  aller  Religionen  zur  Zeit  der  grossen  Wel- 
tausstellung  in  Chicago  im  Jahre,  1893.  • —  In  keinem 
anderen  Lande  der  Welt  hatte  eine  so  kiihne  weltumfas- 
sende  Idee  gefasst — viel  weniger  noch  zur  Ausfiihrung 
gebracht  werden  konnen  !" 

"Wenn  die  Lehre  von  einer  Ur-Offenbarung  bisher  von 
den  Laien  gutglaiibig  hingenommen  wurde,  so  hat  der 
Geist  des  Friedens,  der  die  Versammlung  in  Chicago 
beseelte,  aller  Welt  klar  gelegl,  dass  es  auf  Erden  wirklich 
eine  Ur-Religion  giebt,  und  dass  die  Spuren  dieser,  wenn 
auch  vielfach  missverstandenen,  vielfach  entstellten,  viel- 
fach  missgestalteten  Ur-Religion  eben  jene  zween  Gebote 
sind,  die,  wenn   auch   theilweise  stark  verdunkelt,  in  alien 


NOTES.  405 

Welt-Religionen  wieder  zu  erkennen  sind."     Prof.  Wilhelm 
von  Zehender,  Munich. 

Note  5,  p.  309. 

"According  to  habits  of  thought  but  recently  broken  up, 
God  had  only  one  Son.  Our  race,  while  in  an  unfilial  mood, 
was  not  composed  of  the  children  of  the  Highest.  By 
nature  men  belong  to  the  animal  kingdom  ;  to  the  kingdom 
of  the  spirit  they  belong  only  by  the  miracle  of  regenera- 
tion and  the  condescension  of  the  Divine  adoption.  This 
opinion  is  no  longer  preachable  or  credible  among  thinking 
men.  It  is  obviously  inconsistent  with  Christian  theism 
and  Christian  ethics.  If  it  still  lives  in  the  schools,  it  is 
utterly  dead  in  the  great  fields  of  militant  Christendom. 
It  is  the  mother  of  fatalism  and  despair.  It  postpones  all 
Christian  ethical  appeal  until  regeneration  has  taken  place, 
that  is,  until  the  animal  has  been  made  over  into  a  man 
and  a  child  of  God;  and,  as  that  new  creation  is  the  work 
of  the  Eternal  Spirit,  Christian  morality  has  no  sphere  of 
operation  except  in  the  e.xtremely  limited  community  of 
believers  in  their  own  regeneration."  The  Christ  of  To-day, 
Gordon,  p.  79. 

Note  6,  p.  315. 

"Some  gentle  critics  who  see  no  good  except  in  old 
stereotyped  lines  of  action  will  doubtless  forbode  only  evil 
from  such  a  'new  departure.'  They  will  consider  the 
Church  degraded,  because  she  stood  there  in  the  midst  not 
only  of  her  own  truant  children,  but  even  of  the  heathens. 
But  the  dear  Lord,  who  has  said  that  His  Church  must 
bring  forth  from  her  treasures  'new  things  and  old,'  and 
who  has  made  her,  as  St.  Paul  says,  'a  debtor'  to  all  the 
outside  wanderers  and  gropers,  will  be  sure  to  view  the 
matter  differently.  For  Him  alone  was  the  work  under- 
taken and  carried  on  ;  and  to  His  honor  and  glory  may  all 
of  its  results  redound."     Archbishop  John  J.  Keane. 

Note  7,  p.  326. 

"India  wants  nothing  so  much  as  a  religious  revival,  or 
rather  a  restoration.     There  is  no  real  unity  for  the  nation 


4o6    CHRISTIANITT,   THE   WORLD-RELIGION. 

except  through  one  faith;  political  unity  is  uncertain.  The 
struggle  lies  in  the  future  between  a  new  religion  for  the 
people  and  revival  of  the  old."  India,  Forty  Years  of  Pro- 
gress and  Re  fo>-m,  by  R.  P.  Karkaria,  p.  112. 

Note  8,  p.  327. 

"It  was  a  wonderful  meeting,  prophetic  of  great  ad- 
vances in  the  spiritual  life  of  mankind.  When  our  holy 
faith  is  brought  face  to  face  with  any  other  the  comparison 
itself  is  an  argument  for  Christianity.  Believing  as  I  do 
that  Christ  is  that  Light  which  is  in  every  man  who  comes 
into  the  world,  I  shall  be  amazed  not  to  discover  the  evi- 
dence of  His  presence  and  energy  in  all  lands.  This  book 
is  a  sign  of  his  coming,  the  glorious  appearing  of  the  Son 
of  Man,  a  sign  that  He  is  even  now  the  world's  best  life." 
Professor  C.  R.  Henderson,  D.D.,  on  the  Record  of  the 
Parliament  of  Religiotis. 


INDEX. 


Abbott,  Dr.  Lyman,  319. 
Abraham,  126,  133. 
Abyssinia,  81.  • 

Adler,  Rabbi,  296. 
Africa,  61,  191. 
Agni,  376,  377. 
Agnosticism,  decadent,  30. 
Akbar  292,  296,  323,   ,  402. 
America,   Biblical  origin  of, 

193- 
progress  of  Christianity  in 
194,  239,  294. 
American   Christianity,  hos- 
pitable and  progressive, 

355.  356- 

Angelico,  Fra,  228. 

Anglican  Church  and  Parli- 
ament of  Religions,  298, 

403- 
Anglo-Saxon  race,  35,  97. 
Arnold,   Matthew,    217,   269, 

355,  369- 
Arnold,  Thomas,  233,  269. 
Asiatic,  35,  209,  210. 
Asoka,  48,  296,  323. 
Augustine,   St., 53,  83,  232. 
Avesta,  382. 

Bacon,   129. 

Balfour,  Arthur  J.,  167,  263. 

Bascom,   Professor,  305. 

Beha  Allah,  38. 

Bernard   of    Clairvaux,   233. 

Bible,  157,  198. 

adapted  to  all,  175. 

and   other    sacred    books, 
178,  180. 

an  honest  book,  183. 

an    organic    growth,     180, 
181. 


Bible  as  literature,  169,  184, 
382. 
not    shaken    by    criticism, 

186. 
of  divine  origin,    184,    185. 
progressive  revelation,  181, 

182. 
revision  of,  157. 
spread     of    its     influence, 

161,  163. 
translates  well,   174. 
Blackie,  Professor,    160. 
Boardman,     George     Dana, 

317.  389- 

Bonney,  C.  C,  300. 

Book  of  the  Dead,  165. 

Brace,  C.    L.,    362,    374,  385. 

Brahmanism,  378. 

Brahmo  Somaj  and  Parlia- 
ment   of   Religions,  299, 

311- 
Brotherhood,  human,  41,  96, 

156. 
Brooks,  Phillips,  138,  389. 
Bruce,    Professor  A.B.,  281, 

305.  316- 

Bryce,  Professor  James,  193. 

Buddha,  Gautama,  125, 
135,  138,  148,  205,  214, 
220,  222,  226,   255. 

Buddhism   and    animal   life, 

and  Christianity,  370,  371. 
and  re-incarnation,  366. 
characteristics   of,    91,    92. 

94,  95,  no,  190,  207,  230, 

248,  255. 
effects  of,  103. 
ethical,  oriental,  59,  60. 
in  China,  371. 


407 


4o8 


INDEX. 


l^uddhism,    missionary,    45, 
46-  47,  351- 
scriptures  of,    166. 
Bunyan,  John,  230. 

Caird,  John,  351. 

Caird,      Principal     Edward, 

68,  351,  354.  380. 
Calvin,  John,  204. 
Candlin,  George  T.,  318. 
Carpenter,  J.   Estlin,  292. 
Carroll,  Dr.  194. 
Castelar,  on     Parliament   of 

Religions,  309. 
Channing,  219,   279. 
Charity,  43. 
China,    134,    190,     192,     igS, 

361,  362,  371. 
Christ  and  founders  of  other 

faiths,  202,  207,  213,  214. 
and  prophecy,   205. 
bibliography  of  the  life  of, 

389- 
God's    revelation    for   all, 

22,  113. 
His  perfect  moral  nature, 

218,  227. 
idealism,  68. 
inspiration  of  love,  203. 
portrait    in    Gospels    true, 

285. 
the    distinctive     truth     of 

Christianity,    14,   34,  36, 

37,  44,  75,  202,  203. 
the  incomparable,  392. 
the    reconciler,     235,    324, 

325. 

the  revelation  of  God,  136, 
153,  229,  230. 

universal  Kingship  of, 227. 

universal     IVlan    and    Sa- 
viour, 201,  240. 

words  of,   their   influence, 
217. 
Christendom,   greatness,  57, 
61,  62. 

sins,  75,  77,  81,  82,  84. 
Christianity  an  art,  233. 

and  Anglo-Saxon  peoples, 
72,  73- 


Christianity    and    other    re- 
ligions, 31,  33,  34.  38,  62, 
78,   79,   82,  104,  136,  234, 
312. 
and  twentieth  century,  64, 

65,  102. 
a    religion    of    facts,    257, 

258. 
changeable,  89,  90. 
conquests,    55,    56,    72,    85, 

86,  87,  195,  196,  274. 
democratic,  98,  loi. 
described,   36. 
effects,  73,  74. 
greatest  of  facts,  274. 
historic  character  of,  243, 

289,  394. 
hopeful,  95. 
inclusive,  44. 
influence  on  nations,  98. 
and  Hinduism,   353. 
living,  90. 
many-sided,  96. 
more  than  a  creed,  37. 
of  divine  origin,    106,  275. 
progressive,  91,  92,  93. 
supernatural     origin      of. 

264,  286. 

universal  and  missionary. 

15,  16,  22,  35,   37,  41,  47, 

48,  52,  53.  55.  63,   69,  70, 

world's  need  of,  326,  327. 

Church  of  God,   foundation 

of,   286. 
Civilization    and    Christian- 
ity, 92,  104,  105. 
Clarke,  James  Freeman,  351, 

374- 
Classical   Literature,   enthu- 
siasm for,  164. 
Coleridge,  191. 
Cologne  Cathedral,  243,  249. 
Columbian  Exposition,    304, 

331.  332. 
Columbian    Exposition    and 
Parliament  of  Religions, 
299,  300. 
Comparative   Theology,    30, 

44.  68. 
Comte,  Auguste,  228. 


INDEX. 


409 


Confucianism,     43,     48,     59, 

179.  254- 
Confucius,     148,     166,     208, 

215,  220,  226,  389. 
Conscience,  123,  124. 
Conversions,  the   great,  231. 
Cook,  Dr.  Joseph,  314,  318. 
Curzon,     George     N.,      362, 

371.  372. 

D'Alviella,  351,  374. 
Darwin,  loi,  158. 
DeForest,  J.  H.,  315. 
Dennis,  J.  S.,   315,   3i7.   S^S- 
Desire  not  wrong,  68. 
D'Harlez,  Mgr.  320. 
Dharmapala,   318. 
Dodds,  Dr.  Marcus,  352. 
Dorner,  204. 

Drummond,  Professor  Hen- 
ry, 28,  122,  190. 
Dudley,  Bishop,  319. 

Ellinwood,  Dr.  F.  F.,  323, 
370,  379.  391- 

Emerson,  121. 

England,  Christian  Exten- 
sion of,  196. 

English  Christianity,  367, 
368. 

Epistles  of  Paul,  273,  279. 

Ewald,   igi. 

Fairbairn,  Principal  A.  M., 
99,  no,  156,  374,  375,  379- 

Farrar,  F.  W.,  72,  363. 

Fatherhood,  God's,  112,  114, 
117,  118,  133,  156,  214. 

Fiske,  John,  196. 

Eraser,  Prof.  A.  C,  354,  374. 

Freedom,  growth  of,  93. 

Fremantle,  W.  H.,  200,  237, 
352,  395.  396- 

Gibbons,  Cardinal,  319. 
Gladden,    Washington,    318. 
Gladstone,    57,    61,    233,  259, 

298.  333- 
God  and  conscience,  124. 
and  history,   303. 


God,    Christian    doctrine  of, 
112,  115. 

Hindu  doctrine  of,  125,  136. 

holiness  of,  129. 

love  of,  133,  137. 

Mohammedan  doctrine  of, 
135.  150. 

not  localized,   126. 

omnipresent,  I2I,  122. 

personal,  120,   125,  142. 

spiritual,  121,  127. 

the    redeeming,    132,    143, 
147. 

unity  of,   116,  119. 
Goethe,  no. 
Golden  Rule,  43. 
Goodspeed,  Geo.  S.,  156. 
Gordon,    Dr.    Geo.,  200,  376, 

378.  405- 
Gore,    Canon,    47,    151,    266, 

333.  374- 

Gospels,    inspiration    of    lit- 
erature, 212. 
origin  of,  272,  273. 
teaching  of,  211. 

Goths,  88. 

Gottheil,  Rabbi,  319. 

Grant,  Principal  G.    M.,  33, 
302,  352. 

Greek  Church,  36,  236. 

Greek  Language  and  Litera- 
ture, 53,  71,  206. 

Greek    Philosophy     ineffect- 
ive, 395. 

GrifRs,   W.    E.,   68,  91,     no, 
361,  375- 

Grotius,  98. 

Haines,  C.  R.,  351, 
Hamlin,  Cyrus,  314. 
Harnack,  242. 
Harper,  Wm.  R.,   292. 
Harrison  Frederick,  370. 
Haskell,  Mrs.  C.    E.,   9,    23, 

25.  333.  337.  338. 
Hebrew  Language,  53. 
Henderson,  C.  R.,  406. 
Higginson,  T.  W.,  319. 
"Hindu"  (Madras),  346. 
Hindu  Christians,   25,  26. 


4IO 


INDEX. 


Hindu  Sacred  Books,  171. 
Hinduism,  absorbing  power, 

33,  qy,  113.  .249.  372. 

and  moral  evil,  379. 

an  idolatry,  364. 

national,  45,   59,   248,  254. 

origin  of,  not  Satanic,  356. 

philosophic,  365. 

tested,  79,  103,  125,  136. 
Hugo,  Victor,  223,  380. 
Hume,  Robert  A.,   319,   331. 
Huxley,  Professor,  268. 
Hyacinthe,  M.   Loyson,   368, 
369. 

Incarnation,   139. 
India,  103,  106,    ig8. 
divisions  of,  393. 
Dr.  Barrows's  journey  in, 

335-  342._ 
lack  of  unity  in,  360. 
religious  need  of,  405. 
India   Lectureship,   need  of, 
13,  14,  322,   333. 
origin   of,   g,    23,    24,    238, 
240,  287. 
"Indian  Christian  Herald," 

344- 
"  Indian      Evangelical     Re- 
view,"  345. 
Indian  home  life,  387, 
"  Indian   Social   Reformer," 

347- 
"  Indian  Witness,"  345. 

Jains,  358. 

Japan,  116,  159,  189,  192. 
Dr.    Barrows's  journey  in 
342. 
Jessup,  Henry  H.,  214. 
Jevons,  351,  375,  376,  385- 
John's  Gospel,  161,  271,  272. 
Jones,  Rev.   J.  P.,    341,    356, 

357- 
Tones,  Sir  William,  191. 
Judaism,  48,    50,    53,    55,    58, 

119,  125,  126. 

Keane,  Archbishop,  310,  317, 
405- 


Kellogg,  S.  H.,  351,  374,  379. 
Kidd,  Benjamin,    72,  304. 
Kingdom  of  Heaven,  56,  57. 
Kojiki,  166,  382. 
Koran,    135,     159,    160,    171, 

172,  173.  197.  254.  373- 
Kuenen,  69,  135,  352. 
Laotse,  43,  48,  166. 
Latin,  53. 

Lawrence,  E.  A.,  363. 
Lightfoot,  Bishop,  115. 
Lincoln,  iii. 
Lord's  Prayer,  114,  309. 
Lotze,  118. 
Luther,    161,    204,    226,    231, 

233- 

Macdonald,    Rev.  Dr.  K.   S., 

18,  336,  376,  377. 
Mackichan,  Dr.,  340. 
Madagascar,   9,    18,   22,    190, 

191. 
Malabari,    B.    M.,   359,    367, 

386,  393,  395. 
Manu,  spiritual,  127. 
Manu,  Laws  of,  189. 
Martin,  Dr.  W.  A.  P.,  78,  315. 
Martineau,  James,  121. 
Maurice,  Frederick  D.,  233. 
McGilvary,  Daniel,  315. 
Menzies,   351. 
Merivale,  363. 
Messianic  hopes,  50,  51. 
Metempsychosis,  365,  366. 
Mills,  B.  Fay,  319. 
Milton,  John,  204,  233. 
Miracles,   25S,  266,   267,  270, 

396,  400. 
Mitchell,  J.  Murray,  358,  359, 

373,  377- 
Moffat,  Robert,  102. 
Mohammed,  148,  226,  390. 
Mohammedanism,  character 
and    mission  of,   33,   42, 
45,  81,   89,    180,  207,  248. 
effects  of,  364. 
limits  of,  70,  104. 
not  universal,  61,  62,  63. 
Monotheism,  117,  125,  129. 
Morality,  real,  40,  41. 


INDEX. 


Moses,  49,  120,  224,  226. 
Mozoomdar,    9,    18,    22,    209, 

231.    313.    318,   337,    338. 

390,  391,  392,  403. 
Miiller,  Prof.  F.  Max,  17,  38, 

82,    104,    184,    351,    352, 

383.  385.  386,  403- 

Napoleon,  223. 
Neander,  152,  204. 
Newman,  Cardinal,  74. 
Newton,  125. 
New  Zealand,  196. 
Niebuhr,   269. 
Nirvana,    153. 
Non-Chrislian        Literature, 

noble  elements  of,  383. 
Nouri,  the  patriarch,  341. 

Old  Testament,  44,   48,  118, 

120. 
Orr,  Prof.  James,  307. 

Palestine,     epitome    of    the 

world,  168. 
Palmer,    Prof.    Geo.    H.,  68, 

370. 
Pantheism,  112,  116,  121,  125, 

140,  141,  145.  374.  380. 
Pariahs,  373. 
Parker,  Theodore,   219. 
Parks,  Edward  A.,  158. 
Parliament  of  Religions,  10, 

23,   34,   46,  114,  238,  292, 

328,   331.    333.    348,    401. 

402. 
Parsees,  58,  114,  166,  357. 
Pascal,  118,  221. 
Paul,    the   apostle,   115,  117, 

128,    145,    168,    170,   221, 

224,  231,  277,  297. 
Persecutions,    the  early,  85, 

86. 
Peter,  the  apostle,  285,  297. 
Pfleiderer,  351. 
Plato,  100.  116,  265,  269. 
Post,  Dr.  George,  315. 
Prcssense,  de,  152,  380. 
Prophecy,  44. 
Psalms,  The,  177. 


Redemption,  132,   147. 
Reid,  Gilbert,  315. 
Religion,    absorbing    power 
of  greater  religions,  33, 

41- 
greatness  and  universality 

of,  27,  42,  71,  72. 
origin  of,  28. 
science  and,  29. 
study  of,  302,  303. 
Religious  tests,  75,  80. 
Renan,  86,  222,  261. 
Resurrection  of  Christ,   271, 

277,  282. 
Rice,    Rev.    E.    P.,    22,    242, 

353.  362. 
Richter,  Paul,  223. 
Ritter,  Carl,  163. 
Roman  Catholic  church,  236. 
Roman   Empire,   48,    77,    85, 

86,  100,  206,  282. 
Romanes,  Professor,  273. 
Rousseau,  226. 

Sacred    Books   of   the  East, 

38,  382,  383- 
Saussaye,  351. 
Schaff,  Dr.,  176,  309,  317. 
Schultz,    Dr.    Hermann,    22, 

no,  200,  242,   374. 
Scott,  A.,  D.D.,  352. 
Sen,  Keshub   Chunder,   209, 

337.  360,  388,   390. 
Sikhs,  157,  357. 
Simon,  D.  W.,    574. 
Slater,   Rev.  T.  E.,  156,  314, 

340.    353.    378,    380,    383, 

384- 
Slavery,  89,  93. 
Smith,  Robertson,    177,   251, 

395. 
Socrates,  223,  226,  390. 
Soma,  377. 

Spencer,  Herbert,  70,  73,  124. 
Spinoza,  141. 
Spirit   of    God,    everywhere, 

25- 
Stanley,  Dean,  269. 
St.  Francis  of  Assisi,  233. 
St.  Hilaire,  107,  220. 


412 


INDEX. 


Storrs,  Dr.  R.  S.,  363. 
St.  Peters  Church,   130,  131. 
Strauss,  141,  264. 
Sympathy,      Buddhist     and 

Christian  conception  of, 

392- 

Tagore,  Sir  J.  M.,   reception 

by,  335- 
Tamil  Proverbs,  179. 
Ten     Commandments,     187, 

188. 
Tennyson,  234,  292,  298. 
Thayer,  Prof.  John  H.,  306. 
Theism,  Christian,    123,  127. 

literature  of,  374. 
Toleration,  39,  40. 
Trench,  Archbishop,  43. 
Trinity,  140,  268. 
Tyler,  C.  M.,  351. 

Unity  of  Mankind,  40,  41, 

45. 
Universal  Book,  157,  198. 
University    of    Chicago,    10, 

23.  335- 
Upanishads,    156,    167,    193, 

378,  379.  380,  383.  •384- 

Varuna,  118,  374. 


Vedas,    137,    138,     152,     166, 

193,  382,  386. 
Victoria,  Queen,  197. 
Vincent,  Bishop  J.  H.,     321. 
Virgil's  Eclogues,  380. 

Warren,  President,  305,  365. 

Washburn,  Pres.  George, 
79,  318. 

Welinkar,  Prof.  N.  G.,  353, 
36S,  387. 

Wesley,  John,  231,  233. 

Westcott,  B.  F.,  374. 

Wherly,   E.  M.,  314. 

Whittier,  292. 

Williams,  Sir  Monier,  45, 
94,  372,  374-  387,   388. 

Wolkonski,    Prince,  318. 

Womanhood  and  Christian- 
ity, 89,  97,  188,  189,  232. 

Womanhood  in  India,  386, 
387- 

World-religion,  not  eclectic 
merely,  31,   32. 

Xenophon,  223. 

Zehender,    Prof.    Wm.     von, 

404,  405. 
Zoroaster,  152,  389. 


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